Lost And Then Found
by Dragon Star Empress
Summary: 2007 movie While stopping the bots created when Sam fell with the Allspark Optimus loses the last piece of it and then has to get it back from the woman who found it. OptimusxOC IronhidexOC BumblebeexOC
1. Chapter 1

I'm a very new Transformers fan; I just saw the movie for the first time about two weeks ago so my knowledge about the Transformers is limited to the movie and a few things I've seen in other fanfictions. Advice or suggestions are welcome as well as constructive criticism and feel free to point out any mistakes involving the Transformers or my writing, this is my first fanfic that I haven't had a beta reader for and I'm not very good at remembering proper punctuation so I'm sure there will be mistakes.

This starts out right after Megatron was destroyed.

Disclaimer: I don't own anything except for my original characters.

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Shortly after the final battle with Megatron the government officials had told the Autobots that it would be best if no one else found out about them. All of the down town area where the battle had taken place was blocked off and the news crews were being told that the robots had been made by a terrorist group and military choppers flew over the area making sure no one could get close enough to see what was happening on the ground.

Ratchet had checked everyone's injuries and after finding no serious damage on the others he had started to work on repairing Bumblebee while they waited for a truck to be brought to transport him to somewhere safe where Ratchet could finish the repairs.

After searching for injured people and having captain Lennox and his men take them to the rescue workers who hadn't been allowed into the block where the Autobots were waiting everyone had collapsed. Sam and Mikaela were sitting next to Bumblebee trying to keep him distracted while Ratchet worked on repairing him, captain Lennox and his men were being checked by a paramedic and Optimus and Ironhide were discussing what they would do now that Megatron had been defeated.

Optimus had just pulled out the piece of the Allspark as he was telling Ironhide about it when his arm was hit by a small missile causing him to drop it. Another missile barely missed his head and he turned and saw an almost human sized robot aim at him again. Before it could fire again Ironhide fired one of his cannons at it, destroying it.

After discussing where the robot could have come from and finding out that Sam had fallen with the Allspark. Optimus said. "Ratchet stay here, keep working on Bumblebee and watch the children. Ironhide and I will split up and search the area and make sure there are no more of those things running around."

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A couple of blocks away.

Ella finished tying a strip of cloth around a deep cut in an old woman's arm, "Just keep pressure on that and the bleeding should slow down." She told the woman's husband, "Stay here and as soon as I see rescue workers I'll send them to get you." She said before heading off to look for other injured people.

As she headed down the road between cars and ruble she stopped and checked each car for people and sadly found that most of the ones who were still in the vehicles were already dead. Spotting a clothing shop she went in and started taking clothes that could easily be torn into bandages, she found a backpack and started to stuff the clothes into it when someone yelled at her to stop. She turned around and saw a terrified woman standing behind the register.

"Look I'm not stealing these to keep them, I haven't seen any rescue workers yet and people are bleeding to death out there. I need something else to use for bandages, I'm kind of running out of clothes, this was a full length skirt when I started helping people." Ella said indicating the skirt that now barely came half way to her knees. "Do you still have running water here?" she asked.

"I don't know I haven't moved from here since the explosions started." The woman replied.

"Where's you bathroom?" Ella asked.

"It's back there." The woman said pointing to the back of the store.

"Here start tearing these into strips for me." Ella said tossing the clothes onto the counter then grabbed a couple of plastic bags and another pile of clothes.

"What are you doing with those?" The woman asked.

"I'm going to get them wet so I can at least partially clean people's wounds." Ella said grabbing a pack of ponytail holders as she headed to the bathroom.

Ella quickly washed the blood and dirt off of her hands and face, pulled her long black hair into a quick braid then took off her denim jacket and cleaned then tightly bandaged a deep cut on her left arm. It hurt horribly, but she knew she had been lucky. She had left home at five that morning so she could spend the whole day at the court house and library in Mission City, her biggest concern when she left home had been whether she would find all of the records she was looking for before they closed. Now she was trying to keep herself alive as well as help as many people as she could. She wasn't even sure what had happened, she had stayed inside of the court house watching from the windows as what looked like giant robots occasionally came into view fighting each other and shaking the buildings around them, at one point something had slammed into the court house causing lights and plaster to fall from the walls and ceiling and the windows to break, including the one she had been standing by, showering pieces of broken glass over her and leaving her with dozens of small cuts as well as the larger one on her arm. No one she had talked to knew anything about what had been happening or where the robots had come from and she couldn't come up with any explanations that didn't seem crazy. When things had finally quieted down she had suggested that those who weren't injured should help those who had been hurt outside. Just looking out the windows it was obvious there were going to be a lot of people who would need help, but everyone else seemed to be too afraid to go out so she had headed out by herself. Sighing she tore her mind from the events of the day and finished soaking the clothes then put them in the bags and headed back out. Stuffing the wet clothes into a second backpack, she took the one of torn clothes from the woman thanked her for her help and started to leave the store.

"Wait, do you want to change into a pair of pants or something?" the woman asked.

"If you really don't mind I would be more comfortable with a longer skirt." Ella replied.

"Go ahead; the dressing room is over there." She said pointing to the far wall.

"That's alright; I don't need to waste time with a dressing room." Ella said picking a long denim skirt and slipping what was left of her skirt off to reveal a pair of shorts she wore under it then put on the other skirt.

"You wear shorts under your skirt?" the woman asked.

"Yep, I like to wear skirts, but you never know when you might be in a situation where you may need to take a skirt off to do something or in this case use it as bandages." Ella explained then left.

As she came out she spotted a vending machine, she found a good sized piece of metal, busted the lock off, flinching at the pain it caused in her injured arm then stuffed as many bottles of water and juice into the backpacks as she could. She continued down the road helping people out of their cars and unburying several that were trapped in the ruble and cleaning and bandaging their wounds. The ones who could walk she sent back to wait at the clothing shop and the others she promised to send help to. The ones that she couldn't get out of their vehicles or were buried under too heavy of stuff for her to move she would give something to drink and tie pieces of red cloth to the antennas of the vehicles or near where the people were buried so the rescue teams could get to them quickly. Although she was beginning to wonder if anyone was going to come to help.

After awhile she came to an intersection that was completely blocked by debris from a building that had been horribly damaged so she decided to cut through a nearby ally. When she was almost to the other side she heard voices and started to run the rest of the way until she tripped over a pile of stuff and fell, her hand coming down on something sharp. As she pulled her hand back she saw a long triangular piece of metal with strange markings on it. Curious about the markings on it she decided to take it with her; she picked it up and put it in her pocket then stepped out of the ally.

Everything suddenly went quiet when she stepped out. She looked around and froze when she saw two huge robots at one side of the road one looked like its lower legs had been ripped off and the other one looked like it was kneeling in front of it looking at its legs, but neither one was moving.

"It's alright they've all been deactivated." A man said coming up behind her, making her jump and glance over her shoulder at the man.

"What are they and where did they come from?" She asked looking back at the robots and starting to back away from them. After seeing them fighting and tearing up the city, even though the man said they had been deactivated they still made her nervous.

"Right now, I'm not allowed to say, but the information should be available to the media in a few hours from what I've been told." The man said leading her to the other end of the block.

"Where is everyone? Shouldn't there be rescue teams getting the people out of here?" Ella asked.

"Their starting on the north side of the city and working their way in." He told her.

"Well you need to get someone here right away; there are at least fifty people who need help on the next road over. Some of them are hurt bad and need medical attention right away. I can tell you exactly where they are." Ella told him.

"Alright, we'll get a team down here as soon as possible." He said walking up to another man and telling him to radio for a rescue team then had Ella tell him where the people were. "I'll get someone to give you a ride out of hear as soon as possible." He told her.

"No, you need to concentrate on the people who are hurt and dieing. Do you know if Kreager Street was hit or the area around the library?"

"Just a minute." He said picking up a radio.

While he was on the radio Ella started to walk back towards the end of the blocked off road, wanting to get another look at the robots, just as she was about to where she could see the robots she was grabbed from behind and pulled back a little.

"Their deactivated, but no one is to go near them." The man told her then said. "Kreager Street wasn't affected."

"Good then you just concentrate on getting those people out. My car is on Kreager Street by the library so I should be able to get there and get home." Ella told him.

"What about your injuries?" He asked.

"It's nothing worse than cuts and bruises, the worst cut won't even need more than a stitch or two, if I'm careful hopefully that won't even be necessary. I'll be fine, there are too many people who really need the help and can't get out of there without it. If I find anyone else I'll have them wait where you can find them or mark where they are the same as I did with the others." Ella said picking up the backpacks.

He hesitated a moment, "Fine, but what's your name and how do I contact you to make sure you really get out of here alright?" He asked.

"My name is Ella Haver, I live in Tranquility and this is my address." She said pulling a pen and paper out of her purse, then wrote down her phone number and address and handed it to him.

"I'm Captain William Lennox, are you sure you don't want me to send someone with you to make sure you get out of here safely?" He asked.

"If you send anyone with me I'll just make them stay and take care of the first injured person we see. I'll be fine on my own." Ella reassured him then headed down the road towards were she had left her car that morning.

She had found several more injured people, helped them and had just turned down the road where her car was parked when she heard a noise behind her. She turned to look and saw a small robot about two feet tall with glowing red eyes. She started to back away from it and it lunged at her, its sharp claws ripping into her skirt. She screamed and took off running, she had just passed an ally when the thing jumped and caught her leg, she kicked it off, sending it flying back several feet, but before she could get up it was already back on its feet and coming at her again. She was vaguely aware of the ground shaking like something huge was running then just as the small robot was almost to her a huge robot lunged out of the ally catching the small one in its hand as it landed hard making the ground shake.

Ella sat there too terrified to move as she looked at the huge robot; it had to be at least thirty feet tall. Its feet were still in the ally and its body was stretched clear across the road and it had what looked like red and blue armor on it. It slowly turned to look at her and asked. "Are you alright?"

Ella sat there staring at its face which was only a few feet away from her for a moment, too afraid of it and shocked to reply. Then she looked in to its eyes, something about them gave her the feeling that she was perfectly safe with him and she started to relax enough to answer. "I – I'm fine." She stuttered her whole body still shaking slightly from fear as she looked at it.

As the robot stood up and started to walk away Ella called out. "Wait!"

He turned and looked at her and she said. "Thank you for saving me."

"Your welcome." He said before turning down another street and disappearing from sight.

Ella sat there for another minute thinking about what had just happened then finally got up and headed towards where her car was parked.

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Optimus returned to where the others were waiting and dropped the now crushed robot with the others he and Ironhide had found.

"Did anyone see you?" Captain Lennox asked.

"Only a young woman who was being attacked by that last robot, she said she was alright, but she had a deep cut on her arm that I think would need stitches, it wasn't too severe and other than that she had no serious injuries so I let her go." Optimus told him.

"What did she look like?" Lenox asked.

"She had black hair, brown eyes and was wearing a denim skirt and jacket." Optimus replied.

"I know who she is; she was here about an hour ago. From what I've heard from the rescue teams she helped a lot of people who were hurt today and she refused to let anyone help her get out of here or check her injuries because there are others who are hurt worse than she is. I made her give me her address so I'll make sure she had her arm taken care of before I leave for home, but how did you know her arm was cut if she had a jacket on?" Lennox asked.

"When I asked her if she was alright she didn't answer right away so I scanned her to check for injuries." Optimus explained.

"You can do that?" Captain Lennox asked in amazement.

"Yes, although I can't detect as much as Ratchet can, I'm only able to detect broken bones or deep cuts." Optimus said.

"You guys are fascinating." Lennox said.

"Yeah, but that ability of Ratchet's can also be really embarrassing." Sam said as he walked up to them. "The truck's here to take Bumblebee so we can finally get out of here."

They had just finished getting Bumblebee into the truck when Optimus remembered the piece of the Allspark that he had dropped when they were attacked. After searching the area for it and not finding it he asked the others if they had seen it or moved it, but no one had. Finally giving up Optimus, Ironhide and Ratchet transformed and followed the truck Bumblebee was in out of the city.

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When Ella got home several hours later she carefully bandaged the deep cut on her upper arm then took a long hot bath and hoped it would soak most of the dirt out of the less severe cuts. When she got out she checked her arm and groaned when she found that it was still bleeding. The last thing she wanted to do was go to the emergency room to get stitches, several ambulances had passed her on her way home, no doubt transporting people from Mission City to other hospitals to avoid over running the hospital in Mission City. Ella just didn't think she could handle having to see all the people who had been hurt that day it would just remind her of the ones she had been to late to help. She was already having a hard time dealing with the memories of all the dead bodies she had seen that day and she didn't want to do anything that might make her think about them more than she already was. The only relief she had from those images was the fact that she also couldn't get the image out of her head of the robot that had rescued her, so she tried to concentrate on that. Finally deciding that she would just have to sit and wait at the emergency room while those who were hurt worse were taken care of, she got out an old towel, removed the blood soaked bandage from her arm and wrapped the towel over it and put as much pressure on it as she could with her other hand and eventually dozed off sitting on the couch.

She woke up a few hours later, rebandaged her arm that luckily had almost stopped bleeding and was about to make something to eat when someone knocked at her door.

"What are you doing here captain Lennox?" she asked when she opened the door.

"I know it's late, but I wanted to check on you before I head home. I had the hospitals watching for you and since you hadn't been in I thought I would check on you." Captain Lennox said.

"I'm fine." Ella told him.

"Did you ever get your arm stitched up?" He asked.

"How did you know it was my arm that needs stitches?" She asked a little confused that he new about the injury. When she had first been hurt she hadn't had her jacket on, but after bandaging her arm with a piece from her skirt she had put the jacket on and she had put on a loose long sleeved blouse before starting dinner so he had never had a chance to see the cut and she was sure she hadn't mentioned where it was when she saw him earlier that day.

"A friend of mine said he saw the cut when he ran into you when you were on your way to your car and said it looked like it would need a couple of stitches. So did you get it taken care of?" He asked again.

"No, it's really not that bad and I don't think I could deal with going to the emergency room tonight." Ella told him, still trying to figure out who had seen her that day without her jacket on.

"I thought you might say that." He said as he stepped out the door and signaled someone to come in.

A minute later a paramedic came in and stitched her arm up then the two men started to leave.

"Thank you." Ella said to them.

Captain Lennox smiled, "It's nothing, you have no idea how many people you saved and how much time you saved the rescue crews today. This was the least we could do." He said as he headed out the door.

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Can anyone suggest some good sites to get info about Transformers other than wikipedia? Specifically about the Transformer's holoforms.

Please leave a review.


	2. Chapter 2

Thank you so much to everyone who reviewed or added my story to their favorites or alerts list. I've never gotten so many reviews on one chapter before so I'm posting this chapter a little sooner than I had planned.

Special thanks to Frog1 for the title suggestion.

eagle219406 I'll reply to your review here since I'm sure you wont be the only one to question the size of the Allspark piece. I was actually really worried about the size before I started writing this story, but after taking a few screen shots and comparing the size of the Allspark piece to the size of the glasses when Optimus is holding them, I think it's not too much of a stretch for her to be able to fit it in her pocket.

If anyone wants to see the side by side comparison or the few other screen shots I've done just take the spaces out of this link.

http /s82. photobucket . com / albums / j256 / Elisa84 / Transformers/

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The next day when Ella got to the library where she worked her best friend Rachel ran over to her.

"Are you alright? I thought you were spending yesterday in Mission City doing research. I've been so worried." Rachel said.

"I'm fine, I have a couple of stitches in my left arm, but its nothing serious and other than that just a few small cuts on my arms, hands and legs from broken glass and other debris." Ella reassured her friend.

"Oh my gosh, so you were in the city when those robots attacked?" Rachel asked.

"Yes, has anyone said what was going on yet? I had a hard time sleeping last night and slept through my alarm this morning so I didn't have time to check the news."

"The news papers say the robots were created and sent by a terrorist group as well as the virus that took out the phones, satellites and everything." Rachel told her.

"That would explain why I couldn't get the phone to work."

"You didn't know?" Rachel asked in disbelief.

"I was in the court house looking through old wills and land records from about eight am yesterday until the robots attacked. I wasn't using anything that was affected. So did the news paper say anything else about the robots?" Ella asked.

"No, why?"

"Because it doesn't make sense, the robots were fighting with each other, if they were all made by the same group then why would they have been fighting? From what I saw all of the damage was caused by them fighting, not by them actually attacking the people or buildings." Ella said.

"Are you sure?" Rachel asked, "Maybe it just looked like they were fighting."

"I was being attacked by one when another bigger one saved me and I don't think they were really robots." Ella said.

"Why?"

"Because the one that saved me asked me if I was alright, why would a normal robot ask someone that?" Ella asked.

"Maybe someone reprogrammed it to help." Rachel suggested.

"I don't think so, when I looked into his eyes I could just tell that it wasn't a normal robot it was alive, it was sentient, it wasn't just programmed to help." Ella said.

"Okay, did you hit your head at anytime yesterday?" Rachel asked.

"No, I didn't." Ella said smacking Rachel on the arm. "I know it sounds crazy, but I think that robot was really alive."

"Okay, I'll let you know if I hear anything else about it before you do." Rachel said.

"Thanks. Now I have another mystery to solve." Ella said pulling the piece of metal she had found the day before out of her purse.

"What's that?" Rachel asked.

"I don't know. I found it yesterday; I've never seen markings like these before so I thought I would see if I can find anything similar." Ella explained.

"Well don't lift anything to heavy with your arm hurt, if you need help come get me." Rachel said.

"Alright, do you have a minute you could help me get some books to check?" Ella asked.

"Sure." Rachel said.

After several hours Ella needed a break from looking through the books, so she got out her sketchbook and started drawing the robot she had seen the day before, trying to remember every detail about it.

She was still drawing when Rachel came in and asked. "Are you not eating today?"

"What do you mean?" Ella asked looking up from her sketchbook.

"It's already two in the afternoon and you never took a lunch break." Rachel told her. "What are you drawing that has you so distracted that you forgot about lunch?" she asked snatching the sketchbook away from Ella. "What is this?" She asked looking at the drawing.

"That's the robot that rescued me." Ella told her.

"Why does it look like it has car windows on its chest and wheels on its legs?" Rachel asked handing the sketchbook back.

"I don't know I was a little too stunned by the fact that I was a few feet away from a thirty foot tall giant robot to think about asking." Ella replied sarcastically.

"You were that close to the thing and didn't run for your life? I would have been terrified." Rachel told her.

"I was terrified," Ella admitted. "But I was too shocked to move at first and then when I looked into his eyes I just knew he wasn't going to hurt me. His eyes were so different from human eyes, but I could still see the same intelligence and emotion in them that you would see in a human's eyes and they were a beautiful glowing electric blue." Ella said looking at the picture as the images of the robot filled her mind.

"Do you want a moment alone with your robot?" Rachel asked smiling.

"Rachel!" Ella exclaimed.

"What? You're the one sitting there staring at that picture like most women would stare at a hot guy." Rachel said.

"I am not." Ella retorted

"Sure, what ever you say. I think you've finally lost your mind; it really wouldn't be that surprising, you're twenty five and you've been on what five dates in your whole life and never went out with the same guy more than once." Rachel said.

"It's not my fault every guy who asks me out turns out to have no morals or seems incredibly immature." Ella said.

"Basically you've given up on human men, and you're so lonely that you've convinced yourself that this robot is intelligent, just so you can comfort yourself with the thought that there are other sentient beings out there so that one day you could fall in love with one and not have to deal with the stupidity and immaturity of human men. Maybe it was love at first sight and that's why you can't stop thinking about him." Rachel suggested smiling as she took a few steps away from Ella.

"Rachel that is the craziest thing I have ever heard." Ella said.

"Yeah, about as crazy as a robot that's really alive. Now go get some lunch." Rachel told her.

Early that evening at an abandoned warehouse on the edge of town.

"I have found a faint energy signal that I think is the piece from the Allspark. It's on the outer edge of town north of here. I need your help to investigate and see if we can get it back." Optimus told Sam.

"How would it have gotten here from Mission City?" Sam asked.

"I don't know, but we know that Starscream and Barricade escaped, if they realize part of it survived they could go after whoever has it. We don't know what power it still has, it could still be dangerous in the wrong hands so we must get it back." Optimus told him.

Sam looked up at Bumblebee, "Will you be alright?" he asked. Sam hadn't left Bumblebee the whole time Ratchet had been working on his legs.

"I've been fighting Decepticons longer than you've been alive and I've had worse injuries than this, I'll be fine. Although I do appreciate you talking to me and keeping me distracted." Bumblebee told him.

"What could be worse than having you're legs ripped off?" Sam asked.

"A large sword through my throat nearly decapitating me along with loosing an arm and a few sword cuts that barely missed my spark, that was really painful and no one was sure I would survive, but the only thing that hadn't healed within several months were my vocal processors. So don't worry about me I'm tough." Bumblebee told him.

"I'll keep him talking and distracted while you're gone." Mikaela told Sam.

"Alright." Sam said reluctantly getting up and walking over to Optimus.

Optimus transformed then he and Sam went to investigate.

When they arrived at the house where the Allspark signal was coming from Sam said. "This might not be too bad, I know the lady who lives here. She works in the local history room at the library. She helped me with my family tree project for school and she works in the library at school one day a week so I know exactly when she won't be home and we can sneak in and get the Allspark piece back." Sam told him then smiled, "Or you could just transform and ask her for it, she would probably faint when she saw you and we could get it."

"Why would she faint?" Optimus asked.

"Well some humans faint when they're really scared and I bet it would work with her. She always wears long skirts and she sews and listens to classical music when she works at the school and she just seems like the type of lady who would freak out if she broke a nail." Sam told him.

"I think it would be best to try to get the Allspark piece back without her seeing us. Your government said not to let anyone see us." Optimus reminded him.

"Alright, but that's not as entertaining." Sam told him then said. "She works at the school tomorrow."

"Good, we'll make a plan as soon as we get back." Optimus said before heading back to the old warehouse the Autobots were staying in.

Ella was still search through a huge pile of books she had brought home hoping she would find something similar to the markings on the piece of metal when there was a knock at her door.

When she opened the door she was shocked to see two police officers.

"Can I help you?" She asked confused as to why they were there.

"You already have. We would have called first, but since the phones still aren't working the mayor asked us to bring this to you." The one officer said handing Ella an envelope

"What is it?" Ella asked.

"A note of thanks and a request to include you in the list of people who helped save life's during the attack on Mission City at a ceremony when things have been cleaned up there." The officer told her.

"But I didn't do that much." Ella said.

"We have a list of almost a hundred people who described you as the person who helped calm them and cared for their injuries as best as you could. Some of them would have bled to death before the rescue workers got there if you hadn't bandaged them and calmed them enough to keep pressure on the wounds and a lot of the people trapped under ruble and in cars may not have survived if the rescue workers didn't know where to look for survivors first. A lot of people consider you a hero." The officer told her.

"I'm sure anyone else in my situation would have done the same thing." Ella told him.

"From what I've heard you're one of only a handful of civilians who stayed level headed enough after the attacks to help others. Most people were too scared to do anything other than hide somewhere until the rescue crews came." The officer told her.

"I really made that big of difference?" Ella asked realizing for the first time how many of the people she had seen the day before would have been able to help others if they hadn't been so panicked.

"Yes, you did, from what I heard it took the rescue teams half as much time to get people out from the streets that you had been on compared to others."

After the officers left Ella spent another hour looking through the books she had then she finally gave up.

She then got into a box of material and pulled out a scrap of silver material and made a case for the piece of metal that would cover the sharper corners but leave the rest of it visible. As she was checking to make sure it would fit right her finger caught on a rough edge and she gasped, pulling her hand back as a splinter of the metal embedded itself into her finger. She pulled out the nearly inch long splinter and was going to just throw it out, but at the last minute decided to keep it, placing it in a small Ziploc bag and dropping it into her desk drawer. After checking for any other rough spots she finished putting the piece of metal into its case then attached it to a sturdy necklace chain.

She may never find out where it had come from, but to her it was a reminder that she had made a difference in a lot of people's lives. She had always felt like her life was pointless so now she would always keep the strange piece of metal with her to remind herself of what had happened in Mission City and what she had done there.

The next day while Ella was working in the library at the school Sam snuck out of school during lunch and met Optimus to get the Allspark piece back.

"So are we ready to get this over with?" Sam asked.

"We can't she didn't leave it at her house, she has it with her in the school." Optimus said as Sam walked up to him.

"I cut class and we can't even get it?" Sam asked.

"I'm afraid so, return to the school and see what you can find out." Optimus told him.

"Alright." Sam said running back to the school, hoping he would get there before lunch was over.

Later that afternoon Sam offered to take some books back to the library for one of the teachers. He almost dropped the books when he saw the piece of the Allspark hanging from Ella's neck.

"That's a weird necklace, isn't it a little big?" He asked as he set the pile of books down on the desk.

"I guess it is, but I don't mind. Anyways I'm hoping someone will see it and recognize the designs on it and be able to tell me something about it." Ella said.

"How did you get it?" Sam asked.

"I found it when those so called robots attacked Mission City. I was there doing some research that day." Ella explained.

"What do you mean 'so called robots'?" Sam asked.

"I don't think they were normal robots and I don't believe they were made by terrorists. They were fighting each other, not attacking the city and I saw one close up. I could tell just looking into his eyes that it wasn't just some machine it was a living thinking being. I know it sounds crazy, but I think the government is hiding something about what was really going on." Ella told him.

"Okay, well I better get back to class good luck finding out about your necklace." Sam said as he left.

"Its impossible, we're never going to get it back." Sam said after telling the Autobots what he had found out.

"Well we have to do something; if Starscream comes after it he could kill the woman." Ironhide said.

"Yes, we have to make sure she is kept safe, but how?" Optimus asked.

"What about what you did with Bumblebee, couldn't one of you replace her vehicle." Mikaela asked.

"But she already has a car and Bumblebee isn't very good at pretending to be a car and one slip with her already suspicious about what happened in Mission City could be dangerous." Sam said.

"What about one of the others?" Mikaela suggested.

"Ratchet needs to be available if anyone gets hurt and Ironhide needs to make sure we have a full supply of weapons incase Starscream returns. As long as it doesn't take too long to get the Allspark piece back I could go." Optimus said.

"I don't think she's going to want to drive around in a semi." Sam said.

"I can scan another vehicle to change into as long as it's not too small." Optimus told him.

"Okay one more problem, she has a car and it's a small one so how are you going to replace it?" Sam asked.

"I have an idea if Bumblebee can do it without hurting himself." Michaela said.


	3. Chapter 3

The next week when Ella went to work at the school Sam and Bumblebee were waiting for her.

"If this doesn't work I am so dead." Sam said as he and Bumblebee watched her park her car.

Suddenly Taps started playing on the radio. Sam glared at the radio, "That's not funny." He told him.

"Relax, she looks nice, I'm sure she will be understanding and agree." Bumblebee tried to reassure him.

"And if not you can play the music for my funeral." Sam said.

"Of course, it's the least I can do." Bumblebee said chuckling.

"Are you sure you can do this without hurting your self? Ratchet did say you should be taking it easy while your legs finish healing." Sam asked sounding worried.

"Don't worry I'll be fine, anyways my armor is a lot stronger than normal car metal. I probably won't even get a dent." Bumblebee reassured him.

They watched as Ella got out of her car and started heading into the school then Bumblebee pulled in, in front of her car like he was going to parallel park, but then backed into the front of her car busting the headlights and denting the front and hood.

"Are you alright?" Sam asked bumblebee.

"I'm fine, like I said, it feels like I barley even got a dent." Bumblebee replied.

"Alright." Sam said the opened the door and got out.

Ella turned around when she heard the crash and was horrified when she saw her car. "What happened? Are you alright?" She asked Sam as she ran back to where her car was.

"I'm so sorry; I accidentally shifted it in to reverse in stead of forward. I can pay for it; please don't tell anyone, my parents will take the car away from me. I have some money saved up and an uncle who works at a car dealership. I can pay for the repairs and get you a new car to drive until it's repaired." Sam said not having to fake the fear in his voice because if this didn't work not only would he be in serious trouble they still wouldn't be any closer to getting the piece of the Allspark back.

"Are you hurt?" Ella asked sounding more concerned than angry.

"No, I'm fine unless my parents kill me." Sam told her.

Sighing and hoping she wouldn't regret it Ella told him. "Alright, if you can get me a new vehicle before I have to get home after work today."

"No problem, I'll call my uncle before class starts." Sam said pulling out his cell phone.

"You're lucky the phones are finally working again." Ella said as she got back into her car and after putting a few things into her bag she didn't want to leave in it, she pulled out an extra car key and handed it to Sam. "You're sure you can work all this out?" she asked.

"Don't worry, you can trust me, there will be a new car right here when you come out later and I'll get you're car fixed as quickly as possible." Sam told her.

"Alright." She said then headed into the school.

When Ella came out of the school that afternoon her mouth dropped open slightly when she saw Sam standing by a trailblazer with red and blue flames.

"This is what I get to drive until you get my car fixed?" Ella asked in disbelief.

"Yeah, I know it's kind of big compared to what you're use to driving, but its all my uncle had available, I hope it will be okay." Sam explained.

"Sam this is fine, I've wanted something like this for years, take your time getting my car fixed, I don't think I'm going to want to give this up." Ella said setting her things on the hood and running her hand over the hood as she walked up to the drivers door, "Do you think your uncle would mind me taking it up north for the weekend if my car's not fixed yet? I was planning to go up to my great grandfathers place to try to get my mind off of what happened in Mission City and this would be perfect for exploring around his place." Ella told him.

"I'll ask him and let you know. I guess after some of the horrible stuff you must have seen in the city you would need a distraction." Sam said.

A gust of wind blew open a sketch book Ella had set on the hood of the trailblazer while she had been looking at it and Sam was shocked to see a drawing of Optimus.

Ella picked up the sketchbook, "It's not really the injured and dead people I saw that I need to get my mind off of." She told him.

"Is that the robot you saw in the city?" Sam asked amazed at how much the drawing looked like Optimus.

"Yes." Ella said letting Sam take the sketchbook and look at the drawings, "I just haven't been able to get him out of my head, every time I close my eyes I can see his eyes and it's driving me crazy, I just know he wasn't a normal robot. I've contacted everyone I can think of about what happened in Mission City, but they all just tell me they can't tell me anything except what's already been reported on the news and I just can't believe what I saw was some mindless robot." Ella told him.

"I see what you mean; even in your pictures his eyes look almost alive." Sam said looking at a close up drawing of Optimus's eyes. "These are really good." He told her.

"Thanks, well let me know what your uncle says, I need to get home." Ella told him.

"Okay I will." Sam said handing the sketchbook back to Ella.

"I'll se you tomorrow then." Ella said then got in the trailblazer and left.

That night Optimus contacted the others and let them know that if they thought they would be alright with him away for the weekend to have Sam let Ella know it was alright for her to take him up north.

That weekend Ella drove up to her great grandfather's property. She pulled onto a dirt road that led deep into the heavily forested part of the property. The road dead ended about a mile into the forest and Ella got out, walked to the edge of the forest and started whistling while she started clearing an area to build a fire.

A few minutes later a cougar jumped out of the trees at Ella knocking her to the ground. Having nothing better to do Optimus had searched the internet to find out what would be in the area while Ella had been at work, including the wildlife. He was about to transform thinking that the cougar was attacking her when she started laughing and he realized the cougar was just rubbing its head against Ella's.

"I missed you too, May." Ella said sitting up and scratching the cougars head.

Suddenly May started sniffing the air then walked over to Optimus and started growling at him.

"What's wrong, you don't like the car?" Ella asked walking over to the trailblazer and pulling out a pair of jeans to change into.

Ella spent the rest of the day hiking, playing with May and going fishing in the nearby river. When she got back she set up a fire pit, started a fire and started cooking the fish she had caught. May had disappeared into the woods after Ella gave her the fish guts and Ella was about to eat her fish when she heard gun shots. She made sure she had her hatchet on her belt then grabbed a large stick and was about to head into the woods when May raced out followed a few seconds later by a man with a gun. Ella swung the stick into the man's arms knocking the gun out of his hands and quickly picked it up and aimed it at the man.

"What do you think you're doing on my property?" Ella demanded angrily as May came up behind her and tried to hide behind her legs while growling.

"I didn't realize this was private property." The man said.

"Don't lie to me! I personally put up private property and no hunting signs every three feet all the way around the property. Now get off of my land before I decide to shoot you for trespassing and trying to shoot my best friend." Ella ordered.

"Give me my gun back first." The man demanded.

"You shouldn't have had it on my property now its mine or I can call the police. I'm sure the fines you would be charged with for trespassing and hunting on my land would cost more than this gun. Now get off of my property." Ella demanded angrily.

"Not without my gun." The man said starting to step towards her.

Ella fired the gun hitting the ground a few inches from his feet, "If you don't leave now I will shoot you, you're trespassing on my land, I have a legal right to shoot you and I will." Ella said raising the gun to eye level.

The man glared at her, but finally left.

Ella watched him until he was out of sight down the road then walked back over by the fire and knelt down next to May, "Are you okay?" she asked as she started to check her for injuries. When she was sure she hadn't been hurt she finally sat down and ate her dinner. When she was done she pulled out her sleeping bag, laid it out next to the fire and fell asleep with May curled up, purring next to her.

The next morning Optimus watched in shock as May dragged a dead deer up next to Ella then started pawing at her to wake her up. When Ella opened her eyes she gasped when she saw the dead deer, but quickly recovered from the shock and got up.

"I guess I don't have to worry about what to have for breakfast or where I'll get a skin to make a new pair of moccasins." Ella said scratching behind May's ears before pulling out a knife and cleaning the deer. When she finished she started cooking some of the meat and put some in a bag in the cooler to take home with her then while May ate what Ella hadn't taken she staked down the deer skin and scraped it clean using a sharp rock then rinsed it off with one of the buckets of water she had carried up from the river and folded it up, put it in a bag and put it in the cooler with the meat.

Ella spent the rest of the day hiking, fishing and playing with May. She sat down with her back against a large rock and started drawing more pictures of the robot she still couldn't stop thinking about. "I think I'm going crazy May, I just can't stop thinking about him." She said as May laid down next to her and rested her head on Ella's knee.

Ella looked up from her drawing when May started growling, and saw the man from the day before coming towards her and she quickly got up.

"You're gonna pay for causing me trouble lady." The man said.

"You're the one who caused trouble, you decided to trespass, no one made you do that it was your choice." Ella said sounding a lot calmer than she felt.

The man suddenly lunged at her swinging his fist at her face, Ella ducked out of the way, when he turned back towards her she hit him hard enough in the face to break his nose and make her fist sting.

"You're gonna pay for that." The man growled at her before swinging his fist at her head.

Ella blocked him and brought her knee up hard between his legs making him cry out in pain and drop to his knees. "Now why don't you leave before you get hurt any worse?" Ella said trying to slowly make her way over to the trailblazer where she had left the gun without the man noticing.

Optimus couldn't help smiling as he watched the fight; Ella was certainly much tougher than Sam had thought. His smile disappeared when the man who had his back to Optimus pulled a knife out of his back pocket.

The man lunged at Ella swinging the knife at her, Ella tried to move, but the man still managed to cut her right arm a few inches above her elbow. Ella grabbed a stick and swung it at the man hitting him in the head as he started to get up. Ella started to run to the car, but the man had gotten up and tackled her to the ground. Ella struggled trying to get loose, out of the corner of her eye she saw the man raise the knife to stab her with it. She could hear May growling and she started to wish May hadn't been trained never to attack humans.

Just when Ella was sure she wasn't going to get away from the man a gun fired and the man fell off of her.

Ella looked up and saw a man standing by the trailblazer holding a gun; he had black hair, was wearing blue jeans and a red shirt and was very handsome. He set the gun down and walked over and helped her up, "Are you alright?" He asked her.

"I think so, just a little cut on my arm and a few bruises." She told him, "Who are you and what are you doing here?" She asked as she looked at her bleeding arm and rolled her sleeve up until it was as tight as possible around the cut on her arm.

He hesitated a minute, "My name is Optimus Prime, I was just passing by, I saw that man sneaking around and decided to see what he was doing." He told her.

For a second she thought his name was odd, but she was a genealogist and had heard far stranger first names. Optimus wasn't near as strange for a mans first name as her distant uncle Teagarden. "I'm Ella Haver," she told him, "I'm glad you showed up when you did, thank you, you probably saved-." Ella stopped suddenly when she finally looked up at his face and their eyes met. His eyes were the same electric blue as the robots had been that she had seen in Mission City. Part of her mind was telling her that somehow Optimus was the robot from Mission City, but she pushed the thought to the back of her mind, telling herself it was completely crazy and impossible.

"Are you alright?" Optimus asked.

"Yeah, I'm fine, you just remind me of someone." Ella told him flinching as she adjusted her grip where she was holding her cut arm.

"You should get to a hospital and get stitches in that arm; I could drive you to the hospital if you want." Optimus said.

"It's not that bad, I'll be fine once I get the bleeding to stop." Ella said.

"It's almost three inches long and half an inch deep, it needs stitches." Optimus told her.

"How do you know that?" Ella asked she hadn't even looked at it yet and her sleeve hadn't been cut enough to make the cut visible.

"I saw it before you rolled your sleeve up." He said with a barely noticeable hint of uncertainty in his voice, "Now lets get you to a hospital, without stitches even if you do manage to get it to stop bleeding it will easily pull open again." He told her as he started to lead Ella towards the trailblazer.

"But my sleeve wasn't cut enough to see it, plus as hard as it's bleeding it's impossible to see how deep it-" Ella was cut off as Optimus was shoved forward landing on his knees and she was grabbed from behind and a knife was held to her throat.

"Let her go." Optimus said as he got up and saw the man holding the knife to Ella's throat.

"You should have made sure I was dead before you turned your back on me, now you're both going to die." The man said.

"If I had been trying to kill you the bullet would have done a lot worse than just grazing your head, now let her go. All she's done is protect her pet and herself, she's done nothing wrong, just let her go and leave while you still can." Optimus said.

Ella looked at Optimus wondering how he could have known about the man trying to kill May the day before. The man started to back away from Optimus and ask. "What are you going to do try shooting me again and hope you don't hit the girl?"

""If you don't let her go you'll find out, now let her go, I don't want to hurt you." Optimus said.

"To bad cause I'm gonna kill both of you, nobody crosses me and gets away with it." The man said.

As the man kept backing away Ella's foot came down on the sketchbook she had dropped. Her heart nearly stopped as she looked at one of the fully colored pictures she had drawn of the robot then back at Optimus and the trailblazer he was standing in front of and realized that the color and flame pattern on the robot matched the trailblazer, it seemed completely crazy, until Optimus said, "You leave me no choice then." And disappeared.

A moment later the trailblazer started to pull apart and change in to the same robot Ella had seen in Mission City. The man's grip loosened and Ella pulled his arm with the knife away from her neck, she dashed away from him, but he caught her by the hair and started to pull her back then she heard a weapon fire and the man dropped to the ground. Ella gasped when she turned around and saw the man laying there with a large hole through his side; she quickly looked away and looked up at the robot.

"I had no choice he would have killed you." He said sounding a little guilty.

"I know, thank you for saving my life, again" Ella said staring up at him in shock, her heart pounding.

"Are you alright?" He asked leaning down to look at her.

"I'm fine." Ella replied trying not to smile as the shock started to be replaced by excitement at the thought that she would hopefully finally get some answers to her questions about the robot.

He suddenly transformed back into the trailblazer and the passenger door opened, "Your arm still needs to be taken care of, get in." he told her.

Ella hesitated a moment then told May goodbye and grabbed her backpack and sketchbook, "Shouldn't I drive?" She asked as she climbed in.

""Don't worry, I'll drive." He said.

"And you're going to tell me what exactly is going on, right?" Ella asked.

"I suppose I have no choice now that you know about me." He said suddenly appearing in the driver's seat.

"How did you do that?" Ella asked shocked by his sudden appearance.

"This form is a hologram, although much more advanced and complex than anything humans can create." Optimus explained then started telling her what he had told Sam and Mikaela when they had first met as well as what had happened leading up to the battle in Mission City.

Optimus had just finished telling Ella about the battle in Mission City and how Sam had killed Megatron when they pulled into an old warehouse.

"Where are we?" Ella asked.

"This is where we are staying until the government finds someplace more hidden for us." Optimus explained.

"So you're stuck living in hiding as long as you're on earth?" Ella asked.

"Yes, but it's not too bad, as long as we are in our vehicle forms we can go out whenever we want. Plus we really have nowhere else to go and earth could still be in danger from the two Decepticons who escaped and any others still roaming the universe." Optimus told her.

"So why are we here? I thought you were taking me to the hospital." Ella asked.

"I thought it would be easier to have my medical officer take care of your arm instead of having to explain how you got hurt to the people at the hospital." Optimus told her.

"Will he know how to take care of human injuries?" Ella asked.

"I believe he will, he has spent a lot of time learning about caring for human injuries in the short time we have been on earth." Optimus told her as he opened the door for her to get out.

Ella got out and watched as the trailblazer pulled apart and the pieces shifted and rearranged them self's until Optimus was standing in front of her. "That is absolutely amazing, how do you do that?" Ella asked.

Optimus knelt down, "I'll answer your questions after we get your arm taken care of. Climb on; I don't want you accidentally getting stepped on." He said holding his hand down next to her.

Ella hesitantly climbed onto his hand and he carried her through a large door into the back of the warehouse.

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	4. Chapter 4

"What are you doing back? I thought you were staying with that girl until you got the piece of the Allspark back and Sam gave her, her car back." A yellow Autobot said not looking up from whatever he was working with on the large table in front of him. Ella was a little shocked to recognize him as one of the ones she had seen in the city that captain Lennox had told her were deactivated.

"She was attacked by a human man and injured; I thought you would be able to help her." Optimus told him. "Ella this is my medical officer Ratchet." Optimus told her as Ratchet walked over to them.

"It doesn't look too bad, just needs a few stitches, although I don't have anything that I can use on you to numb the area while I stitch it." Ratchet said.

"That is just the freakiest thing, you being able to tell how badly I'm hurt without me even having to uncover the injury." Ella said.

"Believe me, that's not all he can tell." Sam said coming into the room then asked. "What are you doing here and how did you find out about Optimus?"

"They can explain that later right now Ella is loosing a lot of blood and I need to get it taken care of. Do you think you'll be alright without anything for the pain?" Ratchet asked Ella.

"I think so." Ella replied as Optimus set her down in a corner of the room where there were a few human sized things including a couch and a few chairs.

Ratchet sat down and a few seconds later his eyes dimmed and his holoform appeared near a cabinet and he pulled out what he would need to stitch Ella's arm then walked over to her.

"Sit down and try to hold as still as possible." He told Ella.

Once she had sat down he tore her sleeve enough to get to the cut then started cleaning it. Ella bit her lip trying to hold back tears and not flinch at the pain, but when he started to push the needle through her skin to stitch the cut she flinched causing more pain.

"Sorry about that." Ella apologized.

"There's nothing to apologize for, it was just a natural reflex you couldn't help it." Ratchet told her then turned to Optimus and said. "Come down here and help hold her arm still while I stitch this up."

Optimus's holoform suddenly appeared next to Ratchet, "Just try to keep her arm still and strait." Ratchet told him.

Ella was shocked when Optimus picked her up then sat down with her in his lap then gently wrapped one arm around her back so his hand was on her shoulder and took the hand of her injured arm in his other hand and held it so her arm was strait.

Ratchet carefully cleaned fresh blood from the wound then started to put in the stitches. Ella gasped as he pulled the needle through her skin and buried her face against Optimus's chest and wrapped her other arm around his back, gripping a handful of his shirt in her fist. She was amazed at how real he felt considering he had told her this was only a hologram. She could feel the strong muscles in his chest and arm that was wrapped around her, even the fabric of his shirt felt completely real. She had the same feeling of being completely safe with him that she had felt when she had looked into his eyes in Mission City and even though at first she had been a little uncomfortable with the fact that she was sitting in his lap now she felt completely relaxed being so close to him.

"I'm done, you can let go now." Ratchet said pulling Ella from her thoughts.

Ella pulled her face away from Optimus's chest and realized not only had Ratchet finished putting the stitches in he had already fully bandaged her arm. "Thank you." Ella told him as she got up. "Now what were you saying about a piece of the Allspark when we first came in? I thought it had been destroyed. "

"All but a small piece of it was, the piece you're wearing around your neck." Optimus said as he knelt in front of her, shocking her slightly at how quickly he could go from the holoform back to his normal body.

"That's what this is?" Ella asked in shock, "No wonder I couldn't identify the markings on it." She said as she took it off and handed it to Optimus.

"Yes, how exactly did you find it though?" Optimus asked.

Ella had just finished telling him how she found the piece of the Allspark when Sam came back in with Mikaela and Bumblebee.

"So now can you tell us how you found out about Optimus?" Sam asked.

Ella told them what had happened and Mikaela looked at her like she was crazy and asked. "You have a pet cougar?"

"Well she's not exactly a pet." Ella said.

"From what I have found about cougars they are deadly predators that have been known to attack humans. Why did she not hurt you?" Optimus asked.

"Well about nine years ago I was visiting my great grandfather and we heard someone shooting and he went to find out who it was. He had told me to stay at the house, but I snuck out and followed him. He eventually found a man who had shot and killed a cougar near a cave and was dragging the cougar away. I had gone up by the cave to watch and accidentally stepped on a branch. Not wanting to be caught I ran into the cave where grandpa wouldn't see me. I was about to sneak back out when I heard something farther back in the cave. I followed the noise and found three cubs; they were so small their eyes hadn't even opened yet. By the time I came out of the cave my grandfather had left, so I took the cubs with me. When I got back to the house my mom was furious with me for sneaking off and so was my grandfather, but he was also proud of me for finding the cubs. Luckily he had been a wildlife veterinarian so he was able to get permission to keep and raise the cubs. My sisters and I stayed with him all summer helping take care of the cubs and after school started we would still go stay with him on the weekends. When it was time to let them go the four of us went all the way around the property putting up no trespassing and hunting signs. We thought they would eventually become wild again and in a way they did, they can easily feed and take care of them self's, but when my sisters or I see them their as tame as they were when they were babies." Ella told them.

"What about the other two? I only saw the one while you were there." Optimus asked.

"Ray and Marie are just really antisocial they only come out when one of my sisters are there. Most of the time I took care of May and my one sister took care of Ray and the other took care of Marie and now that their back out in the wild they only come out for the person who took care of them." Ella explained.

"So you just go out there by yourself to play with your pet cougar, isn't that dangerous? It's a wild animal couldn't it attack you?" Sam asked.

"There is always a chance of being attacked by a wild animal in an area as remote as my grandfather's property, but as long as she's still tame enough to come when I call her I figure I should be safe with her." Ella said then asked Optimus. "Didn't you say there were four of you?"

"Yes." Optimus said then asked the others. "Where is Ironhide?"

"Last I saw him he was in the other room complaining about not having anywhere to test the weapons he's working on." Sam told him.

"I'll see if I can drag him away from his work." Ratchet said heading into another room.

"Try not to let him scare you, he won't hurt you. He just likes to show off his cannons and I think he likes scaring people with them too." Sam warned Ella.

Ironhide came in and knelt in front of Ella, "So you're the new human who knows about us?"

"Yes." Ella said.

"Well it's a pleasure to meat you, I'm Ironhide." He said reaching his hand out to her like he was going to try to shake her hand, but as he did metal shifted and a huge cannon formed on his arm, "Just make sure you don't try telling anyone about us." He said.

Ella was suddenly grateful to for Sam's warning as she reached out and shook one of Ironhide's fingers, "It's nice to meat you too, I'm Ella." She said trying to ignore the cannon.

Ironhide stared at her in shock for a moment until Sam started to laugh at him. "You warned her, didn't you?" Ironhide asked bringing the cannon down in front of Sam.

Sam immediately stopped laughing and backed away several steps. Ironhide laughed, "She's never even met me before and she's less afraid of me than you are." Ironhide said then turned to Ella, "Would you like to see some of the other weapons I've been working on?" he asked.

"I'd love to." Ella replied.

The cannon disappeared from Ironhide's arm and he started to reach down to let Ella climb onto his hand, but Ratchet caught his arm and said. "You can show off later. She was badly injured and lost a lot of blood which has left her weak; she needs to get some rest"

"I can rest later, I'm not that tiered." Ella protested although she really was feeling tired, she was just curious about what other weapons Ironhide had.

Ratchet looked at her for a moment then said. "My scans indicate that you are severely weakened from the blood loss. You need to get some rest and something to eat. Sam and Bumblebee can go get you something to eat while you rest."

"Couldn't Ironhide show me the weapons while Sam and Bumblebee get the food then I can eat and won't have to get up later to eat?" Ella asked.

All of a sudden a huge hand gently wrapped around Ella and carried her over to the couch and set her down in front of it. "Get some rest, when it comes to medical orders even I can't win an argument with Ratchet, it's not worth wasting the energy." Optimus told her.

"Oh alright." Ella said reluctantly then laid down and was asleep in less than a minute.

Sam, Mikaela and Bumblebee left to get some food, Ironhide went back to working on his weapons and Ratchet took the stuff he had been working with into the other room so he wouldn't disturb Ella.

It had been about half an hour since Ella fell asleep when Ratchet went to check on her and found Optimus still in the room watching her sleep. "You know you can leave, she'll be fine." Ratchet whispered as he came up beside Optimus.

"I was just thinking." Optimus replied.

"About what?" Ratchet asked.

"How small and helpless humans look and yet not only was Ella able to fight the man off until he pulled out the knife, the whole time she was out in the forest she was able to gather everything she needed from her surroundings. All she took with her was a few bottles of water, the rest of her food she found there and instead of using a match or lighter to start her fire like most humans would she used two sticks, a couple of small pieces of wood and some dried moss." Optimus said.

"You sound very impressed with her." Ratchet said.

"I guess I am, it just amazes me what some humans are able to do. I should go back and deal with the stuff that was left behind when we left in such a hurry." Optimus said a hint of guilt in his voice.

"The man would have killed her if you hadn't killed him, did you really have any other option?" Ratchet asked.

Sighing Optimus said. "No, he was about to stab her, if I had hesitated even a second he could have hurt her badly enough to kill her. But that doesn't make me feel any less guilty for killing him."

"Try to think of it this way; if he was going to kill an innocent woman, he was probably no better than the Decepticons. There are good and bad among all sentient beings, humans are no different. I'm sure you would have felt worse if you had taken the time to find a way to stop him without killing him and in that time he had killed Ella." Ratchet said.

"True." Optimus said then left.

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Please leave a review, they really motivate me to get more written and posted. Thanks to everyone who reviewed on the last chapter.


	5. Chapter 5

Ella woke up a couple of hours later and could hear voices coming from the front room. After looking around the room she was in and not seeing anyone she walked into the front room and was shocked to see a man talking to the Autobots.

"Everything can be cleaned out and there should be plenty of room for all of you and no one will ever know you're there." The man was saying.

"We will come look around tomorrow." Optimus told the man.

"I'd rather not go with you, if you don't mind." Bumblebee said sounding extremely uncomfortable with the idea.

Ella leaned through the door a little farther trying to see where Bumblebee was standing when the door creaked and everyone turned to look at her.

"So you're finally awake, I told you, you needed the rest." Ratchet said walking over to her and let her climb onto his hand.

"Alright so you were right, but I can still walk on my own." Ella said as he walked over to the others.

"You're still weak from the blood loss, there's no sense wasting your energy." Ratchet replied.

"So what's going on and who is he?" Ella asked as Ratchet set her down by Sam and Mikaela.

"This is Tom Banacheck he worked for sector seven and he's trying to find the Autobots someplace to stay that will be nicer than this warehouse." Sam explained.

"Yeah, the government wants them to stay at the sector seven research facility at the Hoover dam." Mikaela said sounding disgusted about the idea.

Ella suddenly understood why Bumblebee didn't want to go with the others; Optimus had told her about Bumblebee being captured and taken to the research facility at the Hoover dam and that he had been having nightmares occasionally that he had admitted were because of being captured. "You've got to be kidding me; they can't seriously think they would be comfortable staying there." Ella said.

"Unfortunately it's all they have been able to come up with and it would be more secure than this warehouse." Optimus said.

"They saved the entire earth, they deserve better than that. Couldn't you just have something new built? Ella asked Banacheck

"We could, but it would run the risk of people asking too many questions. I'm sure you won't be the only person to question our cover story and any major government building projects like that would look suspicious and there's no land available to build something within the immediate area." He explained.

Ella smiled as she realized she had the perfect way to repay the Autobots for everything they had done for her and the earth, "If you did build something it would have to be underground so no one would see it right?" She asked.

"Yes, but what does that have to do with anything?" Tom asked.

"My grandfather back during the gold rush found a huge gold mine, and became ridiculously rich. He started buying land and by the time he died his property was over ten miles square. He always loved the wilderness and cleared enough of the land for a large house, a couple of barns and a couple of fields big enough to grow food for his animals, other than that the land was left as it had been since before any white man laid eyes on it. In his will he stated that the property was never to be split up and that no more of it could be cleared. It's remote and the area around the house and barns is in the middle of it, so it's completely blocked off from anyone seeing it."

"What does this have to do with finding them a place to stay?" Tom interrupted.

Ella smiled. "If you have the men and supplies to build the Autobots a place to stay, I have the land. It's about a forty minute drive north of here; I inherited it when my great grandfather died and it's hidden enough no one would notice if something was being built there." Ella told him.

"And what do you want out of this?" He asked.

"Slugging who ever suggested having the Autobots stay at sector seven after what they did to Bumblebee would be nice. But I'm perfectly content with the fact that I'm still alive thanks to Optimus. Just make sure when the construction is done you can't tell from above ground." Ella said.

"You're saying you'll let us use your land and don't expect anything in return?" Tom asked.

"As long as you can do it without causing any damage to the buildings, that's exactly what I'm saying."

"I'll have to discus this with my superiors, but it seems to be the best option we have at this point. If it sounds alright to you." Tom said to Optimus.

"It sounds like a wonderful idea, I've seen some of the property and I believe the others will like it as well." Optimus said.

"Well then I'll let you know as soon as I know anything." Tom Said then left.

Optimus knelt in front of Ella and said. "We are all in your debt, thank you."

"It was the least I could do, you guys saved the earth and you saved my life twice. Anyways I have all that land someone might as well get some use out of it." Ella said.

"If you have all that land and there's a house on it why do you live in that little house in town?" Sam asked.

"Because the library in Tranquility has the biggest local history room within an hours drive of the property and I love helping people find out about their family history. As much as I want to move up to my grandfather's land I don't get paid enough to pay for the gas to get back and forth." Ella explained.

"So what you need is something or someone that doesn't require gas to get you back and forth." Optimus said smiling slightly.

Ella's eyes widened, "You mean you guys." she asked.

'Exactly, it doesn't seem fair that we would get to enjoy that beautiful place and you would still be stuck in town when you would obviously rather be out there. It's the least we can do to thank you for what you're doing for us." Optimus told her.

'I don't know what to say.' Ella said.

"Say you'll agree. You're giving us a place to stay, much better than what the government could come up with. You should be able to stay there too.' Bumblebee said.

"Alright." Ella said smiling.

"Great, now that we have all that settled Mikaela and I need to get back to my house, mom invited her to dinner." Sam said.

After Sam, Mikaela and Bumblebee had left Ella said. "I should probably be getting home too."

"Not until you've eaten something, Sam and Mikaela left a few bags of food for you in the other room. And when you do go home make sure you don't try using that arm at all." Ratchet told her.

"You don't have to worry about that, as bad as it hurts I'll be doing everything I can to avoid moving it." Ella said.

After eating Ella looked at Ratchet and said. "I ate, now can I go home?"

"I don't know, you're still very weak, I'd rather keep you here where I can keep an eye on you." Ratchet replied.

"You're right, I'm exhausted, but if you really want me to get some proper sleep I need a bed to sleep on, that couch really isn't very comfortable for sleeping on." Ella told him.

"Fine, but as soon as you wake up tomorrow I want you to come back here so I can check your arm." Ratchet said.

"I have to work tomorrow." Ella said.

"Not with your arm hurt, if you lift anything it could tear the stitches and I would have to put more in." Ratchet said.

"Fine, but I have so many questions I want answered, once I'm here you probably won't be able to get rid of me," Ella told him.

"That's quite alright; as long as it keeps you from doing anything that might hurt your arm, I'll be happy to answer your questions." Ratchet told her.

"I'll see you first thing tomorrow morning then." Ella said grinning.

"Make sure she sleeps for at least eight hours before you bring her back, she needs the rest." Ratchet told Optimus.

"I will." Optimus said then transformed, but instead of the trailblazer Ella was use to, he transformed into a semi.

"Why the change of vehicle?" Ella asked.

"This was the first form I took after we arrived on earth, there's a bed in the back, you can lay down until we get back to your house." Optimus said.

"That sounds good to me." Ella said as the door opened and she climbed in.

By the time they got to Ella's house she had fallen asleep. Deciding it would be better to let her sleep Optimus used his holoform to carefully pull the covers over her.

* * *

Please leave a review, the number of reviews I get will help me decide which one of my stories I'll work on updating first. 


	6. Chapter 6

Thanks to everyone who reviewed.

* * *

Ella woke up the next morning and wondered where she was until she tried to move and gasped when pain shot through her arm and she remembered what happened the day before.

"Are you alright?" Optimus asked.

"Yeah, my arm just hurts." She replied looking around the inside of the truck and wondering if she would ever be able to get use to talking vehicles, "Do you know what time is it?" Ella asked as she sat up.

"Eight forty five." Optimus told her.

"Oh shoot, I've got to call into work." Ella said as she climbed into the front seat and Optimus opened the door for her and she climbed out. "Will you be alright out here for about an hour if I get some breakfast and clean up a bit?" Ella asked hoping none of her neighbors saw her standing there talking to a truck.

"I'll be fine, just be careful of your arm." Optimus told her.

"I will." Ella said then headed into the house.

After calling in sick to work Ella quickly ate breakfast then took a quick shower and hoped Ratchet wouldn't be up set with her for getting the cut wet.

About an hour later Ella came out of the house dressed in a skirt and t-shirt and had a new bandage wrapped around her arm. As she walked up to Optimus he opened the passenger door for her, she smiled and climbed in.

"You look like you're feeling better." He said as his holoform appeared in the driver's seat and the truck pulled out.

"I am, I still had some of the pain killers I got from when my arm got hurt in Mission City, so my arm only hurts a little now and I'm really looking forward to getting some questions answered." Ella replied.

"I would offer to answer some of your questions, but I think I'll wait and see whether you run out of questions or Ratchet sends you away first." Optimus told her.

"Will he get upset if I ask too many questions?" Ella asked.

"No, he just might get tired of talking and want to work on some of his other projects. After having his legs fixed, Ratchet wanted Bumblebee to stay in the med bay where he could keep an eye on him. Bumblebee found out the easiest way to get away from the med bay and Ratchet was to just keep talking to him until he sent him away." Optimus told her.

When they got to the warehouse Optimus pulled into the first room and opened the door for her, Ella got out then Optimus transformed and held his hand down for Ella.

"I really can walk on my own." Ella said as she climbed onto his hand.

"Yes, but this is quicker and safer until the others get use to having a human around here." Optimus told her.

"What about Sam and Mikaela?" Ella asked.

"They are usually only here in the afternoon and evening, the others aren't use to having to watch out for a human during the day." Optimus told her as he carried her into the next room.

As they came into the room Ratchet walked over to Optimus and gently took Ella from him. Ratchet looked at her for a second then asked. "Why did you change the bandage and why does it look like you got your arm wet?"

"Jeez, you can even tell that I got it wet with it still bandaged? That really is freaky.

I got it wet because I just spent the weekend out in the woods, I thought it would be a good idea to get all the sweat, dirt and stuff off of me so none of it could get into the cut and get it infected or something. Plus I couldn't stand being dirty any longer." Ella told him

"Alright, but try to keep it dry until I tell you, you can get it wet again." Ratchet told her.

"I will." Ella said then smiled, "So how do you guys transform?" she asked.

"Let me know if you need someone else to take over answering her question, I have a feeling she has a lot of them." Optimus told Ratchet before he left.

Ratchet carried Ella over to the table he had been working on and set her down then sat down and started answering her questions.

After a couple of hours Ratchet asked. "Are you ever going to run out of questions?"

Ella grinned up at him and said. "Probably not, but I could go home if you want me to."

"No, I want you to stay here were I can make sure you don't use that arm." Ratchet told her.

"What, you don't trust me to take it easy?" Ella asked.

"After what I've heard about you, not at all." Ratchet told her.

"What do you mean? Who's been talking about me?" Ella asked.

"Optimus told me about you claiming that your arm wasn't hurt badly when you were first injured and captain Lennox told us about everything you did in Mission City even though you were badly hurt." Ratchet explained.

"I wasn't hurt that badly in Mission City." Ella replied.

"That's exactly why you are staying here, you don't take your injuries seriously enough which could lead to you pulling it open again." Ratchet told her.

"Fine, I'll stay. Now let's see what haven't I asked you about yet." Ella said thinking for a minute then she asked. "Are there female transformers?"

"Of course; at least there use to be, we really don't know if any of them have survived on either side. It was extremely rare for them to join the Decepticons and as far as we know all of the ones that did were killed hundreds of years ago. Most of the Autobot females stayed on Cybertron and were killed when a large force of Decepticons attacked. There were some who fought in the war off of Cybertron, but no one knows if any of them survived." Ratchet told her.

"So do transformers have babies like humans do?" Ella asked.

"Not exactly, although one way there are many similarities." Ratchet said.

"One way?" Ella asked.

"Yes, sparklings, as we call them could be created with the Allspark like the robot that Optimus saved you form in Mission City or a way a little more similar to how humans reproduce." Ratchet explained.

Ella was debating whether she could ask the next question that she thought of without blushing to horribly, when Ratchet's holoform suddenly appeared next to her and he started putting her arm into a tight sling.

"What are you doing?" Ella asked.

"I'm getting rid of you before you ask your next question." Ratchet told her.

"What, can you read my mind now?" Ella asked.

"No, but considering the way the conversation was going and the fact that your face was already heating up, it's easy enough to guess." Ratchet told her.

"Does this mean I get to go home?" Ella asked.

"No, it just means I'm going to let Ironhide keep an eye on you for awhile, he shouldn't mind since he wanted to show off all of his weapons to you." Ratchet told her then his holoform disappeared and he picked her up and carried her into the back room.

Ella spent the next couple of hours looking at the different weapons Ironhide had been working on while he told her what each one did and how it worked. He had finished telling her about the weapons and was letting her watch as he worked on one when Bumblebee came in and picked her up.

"What are you doing?" Ironhide asked.

"I'm rescuing her from Ratchet; I just overheard him say as soon as he's done talking to Optimus he's going to drag her back to the med bay and try to make her get some more rest." Bumblebee said then looked at Ella and asked. "Or are you tired?"

"Not at all." Ella replied.

"See I knew he was over reacting to her injuries, just like he did to me. Luckily for her I'm here to rescue her so she won't have to die of boredom in the med bay." Bumblebee told him then quietly snuck out the back door of the warehouse.

Once they were out side Bumblebee set Ella down then transformed and opened the passenger's side door for her. Ella got in just as the door to the warehouse opened. "Bumblebee! Don't even think about taking her anywhere." Ratchet said when he saw them.

"Do you want to stay?" Bumblebee asked Ella.

"Will you get in trouble if we don't? I don't want you to get in trouble because of me." Ella told him.

"Not too much." Bumblebee replied as he tore away from the warehouse leaving Ratchet in a cloud of dust yelling at him to come back.

Once they got out to the streets where there were other people Bumblebee's holoform appeared in the driver's seat. He looked like he was in his early twenties, had light brown hair and blue eyes; he wasn't quite as muscular as Optimus's holoform but was still obviously in good shape and he was wearing a bright yellow shirt and black pants.

"Do you guys have any control over what your holoform's wear or does it just automatically match what you look like as a vehicle?" Ella asked.

"We can control what we wear, but we can also control the colors of the vehicles we turn into so the preference of colors usually stays the same for the clothes on our holoforms." Bumblebee explained.

"So Optimus chose that awesome paint job he has?" Ella asked.

"Yeah, the truck he scanned when he first landed had a paint job like that and I guess he liked it. When I got here I really liked that we could chose more colorful paint jobs. Back when we were out in space and back on Cybertron we had to try to blend in with our surroundings, here it doesn't mater as much since there are so many human vehicles always around and they come in so many colors we can always blend in." Bumblebee explained.

After driving around and talking for a while Bumblebee dropped Ella off at the warehouse and left to pick up Sam and Mikaela from school before Ratchet realized they were back.

When Ella walked into the warehouse she saw Optimus and Ironhide at one end of the large room fighting.

Optimus had what looked like some type of huge sword that looked like it was coming out of his arm where his hand should have been. Ironhide had a similar sword but Ella could see where he was holding it in his hand. She slipped through the door and stayed along the wall at the other end of the room as she watched them.

She was amazed by how fast and graceful they were even though they were so huge and had to be careful not to hit the walls or ceiling. After a while longer they stopped and Optimus's sword pulled up into his arm and his hand reappeared.

"You guys just have all types of amazing hidden weapons." Ella said as she walked over to them.

"Well I wouldn't call that primitive sword amazing, but I suppose it could come in handy once in a while. It's just not as impressive as a good cannon." Ironhide said.

"I don't know about that, cannons might be better in battle when you don't want to get to close to your enemy, but a sword fight is much more impressive to watch." Ella replied.

"Are you saying you think that sword is better than my cannons?" Ironhide asked lowering one of his cannons to aim it at Ella.

Ella took a few steps back until she was standing next to Optimus's foot then said. "To just sit back and watch someone use it, yes. All you have to do with a cannon is be able to aim it properly to hit your target, which I'm sure takes quite a bit of skill, but to use a sword you have to be closer to your opponent and constantly be moving and I just think it would be more impressive to watch than watching someone firing a cannon."

Ironhide just looked at her for a minute then left the room.

"Do you think I made him mad?" Ella asked worriedly.

"He better not be, you were just giving him an honest answer about your opinion. Try not to worry about it." Optimus told her.

A couple minutes later Ironhide came back into the room with Ratchet following him.

"Don't you dare give that to her, she's hurt, she won't even be able to hold it." Ratchet was saying to Ironhide.

"She has two arms, it's not that heavy she can just use the one that's not hurt." Ironhide said as he knelt in front of Ella and opened his hand to reveal a human sized sword.

Ella hesitantly reached out and took it in her left hand.

"It's a practice sword, I have a small amount of a very rare metal that will cut through Cybetronian armor, there's not enough to make a weapon for any of us, but there is enough to make a few human sized weapons. Since there is a chance the Decepticons will regroup and come back I thought someone should be able to use the metal. Although it will take much practice and strength for a human to get enough force behind the weapon to make it penetrate the armor, Ratchet says it is possible. I was going to wait to tell you, Sam and Mikaela about this until I had the last practice sword made, but since you seem to like swords so much, you get to be the first." Ironhide told her.

"Thank you so much." Ella said smiling "Does this mean you aren't made at me for what I said before?" she asked.

"If you hadn't said it took skill to properly use a cannon I might have been, but I can't blame you for having your own opinions." Ironhide told her.

"You are not using that thing until your arm has healed." Ratchet said.

"But Ratchet I can use it in my left hand and it won't hurt me." Ella said lifting the sword. "You have my right arm wrapped up so well I can't even move it, it'll be fine."

"Fine, but don't complain to me if you end up hurt." Ratchet said then went back into the other room.

"So who's going to teach me how to use this thing?" Ella asked grinning.

"I'll let Optimus start your training, he's better at taking it easy on people than I am." Ironhide told her. "Anyways I still need to get another practice sword made." He said then left.

"Are you sure you're up to this? Optimus asked.

"I'll be fine, but if my arm does start bothering me I'll let you know." Ella told him.

Shall we get started then?" Optimus asked as his holoform appeared next to Ella holding a sword.

"Definitely, although I'm right handed so I'll probably be horrible." Ella told him.

"I'm sure you'll do just fine." Optimus told her.

* * *

Please leave a review. Barricade will show up in the next chapter so if anyone reading this hasn't read Second Chances they should as the next chapter will make more sense after reading it. 


	7. Chapter 7

Thanks to everyone who reviewed the last chapter.

* * *

Ella called in sick to work again the next day after Ratchet threatened to drag her back to the warehouse if she tried going to work. After getting back to the warehouse that morning she had convinced Optimus to train her some more with the sword. When they finally took a break Optimus carried her over and set her on a large desk that sat in one corner of the first room and looked like it had been welded together from pieces of old vehicles and machinery.

"So what do you want to do now?" Optimus asked as he sat down.

"I don't know, I suppose I could go harass Ratchet with more questions and see if he'll send me home. I just feel like I'm wasting your time being here, I'm sure you have better things to do than entertain me." Ella said looking around the desk.

"You are not wasting anyone's time; there really isn't much for us to do here. We have gone over our battle plans for any imaginable Decepticon attacks several times, Ironhide has all the weapons taken care of, Ratchet is constantly researching earth technology and medicine and it's almost impossible to keep Bumblebee here unless I have a job for him to do. We spent so long hiding in space that now that he can go out without worrying about being shot at he just won't stay in one place for very long. It's actually nice to have you around to talk to. If you weren't here I would have nothing to do but worry about the Decepticons." Optimus told her.

"Okay, if you're sure." Ella said then noticed a box that had the piece of the Allspark in it, "Could you teach me to speak and read Cybertonian?" she asked as she looked at the strange symbols on it.

"It is very different from earth's languages, I don't know if a human would even be able to speak it and our written language is very complex." Optimus told her.

"So are ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs, but I taught my self to read those. I've always been pretty good at learning new languages; couldn't you at least try to teach me, please?" Ella asked hopefully.

"Alright, there's no reason you can't try, but don't feel bad if you can't get it." He said, his holoform appeared on the desk and he got out a pen and paper then sat down and started writing strange looking symbols on the paper.

"Okay." Ella replied as she sat down next to him and watched.

They spent the next several hours going over the Cybertronian alphabet and a few common words. Some of the words Ella was even able to pronounce well enough that they sounded right.

Ella spent the rest of the day and most of the next day with Optimus training with the sword, learning more Cybertronian or just talking. By Thursday Ratchet finally said her arm had healed enough that he let her go back to work after she promised not to use her arm.

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"Where have you been all week?" Rachel asked when she saw Ella come into the library.

"I got hurt while I was at grandpa's place and the medic who took care of me refused to let me come back to work until the wound started to heal." Ella told her.

"Since when can anyone tell you what to do? And how badly were you hurt?" Rachel asked.

"Just trust me he wasn't the type of person you argue with. And it was just a cut on my right arm, I got a few stitches and I'm fine." Ella told her.

"Well I'm glad you're okay and that you came back today. My car broke down on the way here and it's going to be at least some time tomorrow before it'll be fixed. Do you think you could give me a ride home?" Rachel asked.

Ella hesitated a minute wondering if Optimus would mind, but if she said no Rachel would have wanted to know why so she finally said. "Sure, no problem."

At the end of the day she told Rachel she would meet her in the parking garage then raced down as fast as she could. When she got there she ran over to Optimus who was waiting for her with his holoform sitting in the driver's seat.

"Get rid of the holoform quick." She told him glancing over her shoulder to make sure Rachel wasn't there yet.

As soon as the holoform was gone she got in and quickly explained. "I hope you don't mind but we're giving a friend of mine a ride home. Her car broke down and if I had said no she would have been suspicious that something was going on. I would have asked you first, but I had no way to contact you." Ella told him.

"It's quite alright, don't worry about it." Optimus told her.

A minute later Rachel got in, "So you said one of the kids at the school got you this until your car is fixed and you didn't have anything to do with the paint job on it?" she asked.

"Right, why?" Ella asked as they pulled out.

"Because the paint job looks like it would mach the paint on your boyfriend that you keep drawing pictures of." Rachel said.

"He's not my boyfriend." Ella said as her face turned a brilliant shade of red and she wondered if she'd ever be able to face Optimus again.

"Well you sure draw a lot of pictures of him." Rachel said.

"So I like to draw, that doesn't mean anything." Ella retorted.

"Sure, whatever you say. I still think it was love at-"

"Rachel! That's enough!" Ella said cutting her off before she could finish, she was sure that if Rachel kept going she would die of embarrassment.

"Okay, okay, you don't have to bite my head off, I was just-" Rachel was cut off as they heard sirens behind them.

Ella looked in the mirror and saw a police car with its lights on following them. Ella glanced down at the speedometer and said, "Great, what do they want, I'm not speeding or anything."

------30--------

A second later a voice came over the radio speaking in Cybertronian, Ella was able to pick out the words need, talk and Optimus, but didn't catch the rest.

"What was that?" Rachel asked.

"I'm not sure." Ella replied as Optimus suddenly pulled onto a back road.

"Where are we going, shouldn't you pull over before you get your self arrested?" Rachel asked glancing back at the cop car that was still following them, but had turned its siren off.

"I-" Ella hesitated not sure what to say.

"You might as well tell her the truth, if this is a trap she needs to know what's going on so she doesn't panic." Optimus told her.

"What was that voice and where did it come from?" Rachel asked.

"You know the robot I told you I saw in Mission City?" Ella asked.

"The one you're always drawing pictures of, yeah, what does this have to do with him?" Rachel asked.

"Well, you're kind of inside of him." Ella told her.

"Ella this is a trailblazer, not a giant robot." Rachel said looking at her like she had lost her mind.

"He can change what he looks like." Ella told her.

"Okay and why would a giant robot be driving you around?" Rachel asked still unable to believe her.

It's a long story, but basically that piece of metal I found belonged to him and he was trying to get it back without me finding out about him, which obviously didn't work." Ella told her.

"And why was that piece of metal so important?" Rachel asked.

"She can explain that later, right now I need you two to listen to me. That police car is Barricade, he wants to talk to me for some reason, I'm going to pull over, he'll pull over a good distance away and we'll use our holoforms to meet half way between to talk, that way if he tries anything I can just turn off the holoform and pull out. I want you two to stay here and don't get out; if this is a trap we need to be able to pull out as quickly as possible." Optimus said as he pulled off the road and parked a second latter his holoform appeared next to the driver's door of the trailblazer and the window opened.

"Where did he come from?" Rachel asked her eyes widening when Optimus appeared.

"I'll explain in a minute." Ella replied then looked back at Optimus, "Are you sure this is safe? Didn't you say Barricade is the one who came after Sam?" Ella asked.

"Don't worry this is the safest way for us to talk. He said he needs help with something and he doesn't want to take any chances of being overheard communicating through the com link incase there might be other Decepticons in the area. He also said that he doesn't want to fight us anymore. I have to see what he wants, if he truly want's to change sides I can't just ignore him." Optimus told her then walked towards the police car and a man who had gotten out of it and was walking towards him.

"Okay, so who's the hot guy?" Rachel asked once Optimus had walked away from the trailblazer.

"His name is Optimus Prime; he's the robot, that was just a holoform." Ella told her.

"Don't you mean hologram?" Rachel asked.

"No, it's solid; he feels completely real, just like a normal human with all the normal senses and everything." Ella explained.

"Okay so let me get this strait, your robot boyfriend can turn into a trailblazer and a really hot guy?" Rachel said.

"He's not my boyfriend, I barley know him." Ella said.

Rachel raised an eyebrow, "You barley know him? Not, there's no chance of anything happening between you two? So does that mean you think you like him but you want more time to get to know him better before you can be completely sure?" She asked.

"Rachel he's a giant alien robot, I highly doubt he would be interested in me." Ella said.

"Hay I'll take any chance I can get to get you to date someone even if he isn't from this planet. It would have to be better than watching you spend the rest of your life alone and unmarried." Rachel said.

"Who are you to talk; last I knew you were still single too." Ella replied.

"At least I go out on dates occasionally. Now admit you like him, I'm not going to back off until you do." Rachel told her.

Ella glanced in the mirror making sure both holoforms were still talking then she said, "Fine I do like him, he's a lot nicer and more mature than any human guy I've ever met. I've only known him about four days and I could already picture my self spending the rest of my life with him, but, that doesn't mean that he's my boyfriend or ever will be. No mater how hot his holoform is he's still an alien robot who would probably never think of me as anything more than a friend."

Rachel started grinning.

"What are you grinning about?" Ella asked.

"I think that's the first time I've ever heard you admit to thinking a real guy was hot." Rachel told her.

"That's not true." Ella said.

"Oh yeah, name one real guy you think is hot and actors don't count." Rachel said.

Ella groaned when she realized Rachel was right then noticed Optimus coming back.

"So what's going on?" Ella asked when he got back and his holoform disappeared.

"Apparently he wants to join the Autobots. He found an injured woman on his way to the battle in Mission City and helped her deliver her baby before she died and he promised her that he would take care of it. It seems to have made him rethink his life. He has no idea what he's doing though and has been searching for us since the battle, since he knew we had human friends who might be able to help with it. He's going to follow us back to the base." Optimus explained.

"Are you sure that's safe?" Ella asked.

"I've already radioed the others, they'll all be there when we get back and Barricade agreed to let Ratchet disable his weapons once we get there." Optimus told her.

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Please leave a review. 


	8. Chapter 8

Thanks to everyone who reviewed on the last chapter.

* * *

When they got back to the warehouse Optimus and Barricade pulled into the front room where the others were waiting.

"Oh my gosh, you were serious and there's more of them?" Rachel asked as they pulled in and she saw the others.

"What? I thought you believed me after Optimus's holoform appeared." Ella said.

"Well kind of, but their- their huge and I just- I don't know but this is unbelievable." Rachel said.

"Wait until you see Optimus." Ella said as the doors opened then she and Rachel got out and stepped back.

Rachel's mouth dropped open slightly and she grabbed Ella's arm as the outside of the trailblazer pulled apart and pieces shifted and rearranged until another robot that was taller then the others was standing in front of them.

"You okay?" Ella asked looking at Rachel.

"Yeah, I think so." She replied still holding on to Ella's arm, "So they can all do that?" she asked.

"Yes, it's amazing to watch isn't it?" Ella replied.

"Yeah, it is." Rachel agreed still sounding stunned.

Barricade slowly started to pull towards them and Ironhide raised his arms as his cannons appeared and started to glow.

Rachel stepped back behind Ella. "It's okay he's not aiming at us." Ella tried to reassure her.

"Ironhide lower your cannons, he can't even transform right now." Optimus told him.

As Barricade pulled in front of Ella a man appeared next to the car, opened the back door and leaned in, a second latter he stepped back holding a baby in his arms. He hesitated a moment looking uncertainly at the Autobots then at Ella and Rachel then he carefully handed the baby to Ella, "Be careful with her." He said then turned and pulled out a car seat and diaper bag.

"I will be." Ella replied looking down at the sleeping baby in her arms.

Barricade's holoform disappeared and he started to slowly transform. Unlike the swift fluid movements when the Autobots transformed, his transformation was slow and occasionally stopped for a second. After a minute or two he finally finished transforming.

"That wasn't nearly as impressive as the other one." Rachel said quietly to Ella.

Barricade glared at her his red eyes seeming to glow brighter. "I highly doubt he's been stuck in vehicle form for almost three weeks." He told her.

"Okay, so you're just stiff, sorry." Rachel said taking a step back.

"Get over here and let Ratchet shut down your weapons." Ironhide ordered.

Barricade glared at him, but walked over to where Ratchet was standing and let him start disconnecting his weapons.

It had been about fifteen minutes when the baby woke up, looked up at Ella and started crying.

"What did you do to her?" Barricade demanded trying to pull his arm away from Ratchet.

"Calm down, she just woke up, that's all." Ella told him.

"Then why is she crying? She has not soiled her diaper, her fuel levels are still good and she is warm enough, she does not cry for no reason." Barricade told her as his holoform appeared and walked over to her.

"Baby's sometimes cry when someone they don't know is holding them. If you're the only person she's seen it probably just scared her seeing someone new." Ella told him.

Barricade gently took the baby from Ella and cradled her against his chest with one arm while letting her hold on to one of his fingers, "It's alright, daddy's here now, I won't let anyone hurt you." He said softly to the baby.

Ella was shocked; she couldn't imagine the man standing in front of her being the same Decepticon Sam and Mikaela had told her about. Rachel tapped her on the shoulder and subtly nodded towards where the Autobots were standing. They all looked completely shocked, their mouths hanging slightly open. Ironhide had dropped his cannons to his sides; Ratchet looked like he had frozen, some type of tool in one hand while his other still supported one of Barricade's arms that he had been disabling a weapon on. Bumblebee and Optimus were just standing there staring although Optimus was slowly recovering from the shock and starting to smile.

"Does she have a name?" Ella asked.

"It's Grannalla." Barricade told her.

"That's an unusual name, is it Cybertronian?" Ella asked.

"It was my wife's name." he replied, a hint of sadness in his voice.

"Can you give Grannalla back to Ella for a second? I need your full concentration on your body for a minute to make sure this worked." Ratchet said.

Barricade hesitated a moment looking down Grannalla then at Ella.

"She'll be alright, she may not be happy about it, but she'll be fine until Ratchet is done with you." Ella reassured him.

He hesitated a moment longer before handing Grannalla to Ella, she whimpered for a moment, reaching one small hand out towards Barricade. "Its alright, I'll be right back." He said softly, letting her grab his hand for a second before his holoform disappeared.

Once Ratchet had finished disabling Barricade's weapons, he and Bumblebee left while Optimus and Ironhide stayed to keep an eye on Barricade while he discussed what he had been doing to care for Grannalla with Ella and Rachel.

"It sounds to me like you've been doing everything right." Ella told him.

"Really? I found so many completely different things on the World Wide Web that I wasn't sure what was right." Barricade said looking down at the sleeping baby he hadn't let out of his arms since Ratchet had finished with him.

"I can imagine, different humans have different opinions about what's best for babies, but you've done just fine with Grannalla." Rachel told him.

"There is another problem you'll have to deal with eventually." Ella said.

"What do you mean?" Barricade asked looking up at her.

"If she were to get sick and have to see a human doctor they would want a birth certificate and stuff." Ella told him.

"Ratchet can take care of humans can't he?" Barricade asked.

"He can, but there are some medicines that you can only get with a prescription from a human doctor. If she were to be sick enough to need that type of medicine we would have to take her to a doctor." Ella explained.

"How do you get these things she would need to see a human doctor?" Barricade asked.

"That's the hard part, we would have to tell someone else about her and then there's a chance they could try to take her from you and put her up for adoption." Ella said a little worried about how he would react.

"NO! No one is taking her from me and she will not be put up for adoption." Barricade stated glaring at her.

"I'm not saying that that will happen or that we have to tell anyone about her right away, I just thought I should give you some warning so we have time to think of how to handle the situation when it comes up. Sooner or later all children end up sick enough to need prescription medication. Maybe Ratchet can come up with something that could work if she needs it. This is just something you'll have to deal with eventually, so I thought I should warn you so we have time to try to work out something that won't end with her being taken from you." Ella told him.

"I'm sorry I yelled at you, I just can't bear the thought of loosing her." Barricade said.

Ella and Rachel had to fight back smiles when they noticed Ironhide and Optimus exchange looks of shock at Barricade's apology.

"It's alright, I'm sure we'll work something out." Ella reassured him.

"Perhaps the human government would allow you to keep her." Optimus suggested.

"I'm a Decepticon, why would they let me keep a human child?" Barricade asked.

"You were a Decepticon. Your love for that child is proof enough for me that you're no longer a Decepticon. That doesn't mean you won't be closely watched until there's no doubt of your change, but I will do everything in my power to make sure you get to keep the child." Optimus told him.

"And what can you do that I wouldn't be able to?" Barricade asked.

"The human's government was very grateful for our efforts to protect this planet. They said if we ever wanted anything just to ask and they would work out the details. With Ella and Rachel's presence to help look after her, I'm sure I can convince them to let you keep her." Optimus told him.

"Even with what you did for their planet do you really think they would let a former Decepticon keep her?" Barricade asked.

"I will simply tell them one of my men wants to keep her. If they want to know more about you I won't lie to them, but the fact that you weren't involved with the battle in Mission City, the fact that you've been caring for Grannalla for almost three weeks on your own, you'll be staying with us and my belief that you have changed, should be enough to convince them." Optimus told him.

"Thank you sir, I-" Barricade was cut off as Bumblebee pulled into the warehouse, Sam and Mikaela got out and Bumblebee transformed.

A second latter Sam screamed and dragged Mikaela with him to hide behind Bumblebee's foot, then peaked out from behind it, looking fearfully at where Barricade's body was sitting against one wall.

"You forgot to tell them what was going on didn't you?" Ella asked Bumblebee.

"I tried, but these two seem to think that as long as I'm driving they can spend the whole trip here making out." Bumblebee told her.

"I don't know how you can stand those two sometimes." Ella said.

"Can someone please tell us what he's doing here?" Mikaela asked pointing at Barricade.

"He's decided to become an Autobot." Ironhide told them.

"And you believe him?" Sam asked still hiding behind Bumblebee.

Bumblebee looked like he was going to say something but wasn't sure he should.

"Go ahead and say it, I've gone soft." Barricade said.

Sam glanced over noticing Barricade's holoform for the first time and asked. "What's he doing with a baby?"

"Her mother was in that bus that Bonecrusher ripped through and he helped deliver her before her mother died and has been caring for her since then." Optimus explained.

"He helped deliver a baby?" Mikaela asked in disbelief.

Barricade shuddered, "Unfortunately yes, I've never seen anything so disturbing in my life." He told her.

They finished telling Sam and Mikaela what had happened then Ella, Rachel and Mikaela had Bee drive them to some stores to get a few more things for Grannalla while the others started setting up one corner of the warehouse up for Barricade and Grannalla.

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Please leave a review. 


	9. Chapter 9

Thanks to everyone who reviewed the last chapter.

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That weekend Ella and Optimus were going to go up to her grandfather's place to get a cradle for Grannalla and decided to invite Rachel, Sam, Mikaela and the other Autobots to go with them. 

It was a hot weekend and everyone was thrilled when Ella told them there was a small lake that they could swim in. After discussing it with their parents, Sam and Mikaela convinced Ella and the Autobots to spend the whole weekend there.

When they got to the house everyone but Ella, Optimus and Barricade headed for the lake.

"I think the cradle should be in the attic." Ella said as she unlocked the front door and led Optimus and Barricade's holoforms up to the large attic. After about half an hour of searching through piles of boxes and other old furniture, they had finally found the crib against one wall behind some of the boxes. They had just finished getting it out when there was a loud explosion outside. Ella ran for the stairs and Optimus and Barricade's holoforms disappeared.

As Ella got to the front door she heard another explosion and saw Optimus and barricade heading towards the fields on the other side of the barns. As she followed them another quieter explosion shook the ground.

"Ironhide you could have warned us you were going to be doing that." Optimus was saying as Ella came around the barn and saw Ironhide standing there with his cannons out and a couple of large holes in the field several hundred feet away.

"What do you think you are doing?" Ella demanded.

"She asked to see what my cannons could do and said you wouldn't mind if we shot at the field as long as we fill in the holes and I'm not even using them at full power." Ironhide explained.

"You really don't mind, do you?" Rachel asked stepping around Ironhide's foot, holding some kind of blaster.

"You told him he could blow up my field?" Ella asked.

"I didn't think you would mind. I mean look at those cannons, they're so cool I just had to see what they could do. And look at this," Rachel said holding up the blaster she was holding. "He was teaching me to use it, isn't it cool." She asked admiring the blaster.

"Fine, but if you two don't fill in every single one of those holes and make sure the ground is flat Ironhide can turn himself into a tractor and you can help him plant the fields this summer." Ella threatened.

"Don't worry we'll have the holes filled when were done here, there is no way I'm turning into a tractor." Ironhide assured her.

"So do you have any more cool weapons to show me?" Rachel asked.

Ironhide smiled, "At least she appreciates a good weapon." He told Ella.

"Well you two have fun blowing up the field." Ella said.

"Oh we will." Rachel and Ironhide both said at the same time.

Ella just shook her head as she, Optimus and Barricade walked to the other side of the house where the lake was.

They came around the house just in time to see Bumblebee run past and jump into the lake, sending a spray of water into the air and all over everyone who was at the edge of the lake.

"Bumblebee!" Mikaela exclaimed from where she was laying in the sun on a now drenched beach towel.

"I thought we came here to swim and cool off, not to lay in the sun and over heat." Bumblebee replied before disappearing under the water.

"Where did he go? How deep is this?" Sam asked when he saw Ella.

"All I know is that it's a natural lake that was here when my grandfather bought the property." Ella replied as she walked to the edge of the lake.

"It's about thirty feet deep near the center with a slight incline towards the edges." Ratchet told them after scanning it.

Bumblebee surfaced on the fare side of the lake, "Isn't anyone else coming in or are you afraid of a little water?" he taunted.

All of a sudden the earth shook as Optimus ran and jumped into the air landing in the middle of the lake and sending a large wave of water over the humans standing at the edge of the lake and knocking Sam and Ella off of their feet.

As Ella got up she noticed Barricade, standing with one hand over Grannalla to keep the water off of her that was now dripping from the tree she had been set under and staring at where Optimus had disappeared into the water with a look of shock on his face.

"Is she still dry?" Ella asked as she rung water out of her hair and walked over to him.

"She is fine and still asleep." He replied as Ella moved the baby seat out from under the dripping tree. "He certainly doesn't act like a leader sometimes." Barricade said as he looked at the lake where the top of Optimus's head was just visible above the water.

"Everyone has to relax once in a while or they would go crazy." Ella replied, "Any way's that's why we invited everyone up here, to forget about everything else and just to have some fun."

"I think this is going to take some getting use to, Megatron never would have acted like this or allowed anyone else to." Barricade said.

"Like I said, if you don't relax once in a while you'll go crazy and from what I've heard about Megatron he was crazy." Ella said.

"Thinking about it now I think you're right." Barricade told her.

Everyone spent the next few hours swimming and relaxing. At lunch time Ella headed inside to get out the food they had brought with them to make lunch. She had carried the bags of food they had brought with them to the kitchen and was about to go back to get the cooler when Optimus walked into the kitchen with it.

Ella smiled, "Thanks, what are you doing in here?" she asked.

"I thought I would see if you needed any help." Optimus told her.

Ella thought she noticed a barely noticeable hint of uncertainty in his voice, but ignored it. "That would be great." She replied as she pulled out a pile of dusty dishes from one of the cupboards and put them in the sink.

After eating lunch the others went back to relaxing by the lake and Ella decided to go for a hike.

"I'm going hiking; I'll be back in a couple of hours." She told the others.

"Would you mind some company?" Optimus asked as his holoform appeared next to Ella, "I've been wanting to see the forest from a more human perspective since you first brought me here." He told her.

"I'd love the company." She replied then they headed into the forest.

That evening they had built a large bonfire and the humans were roasting marshmallows and making s'mores. When they ran out of marshmallows Ella volunteered to go to the house and get more. She had just come back out when she noticed Rachel in front of the house with her arms crossed and looking expectantly at her while leaning against Barricade's cop car that he had left parked there while he used his holoform to take care of Grannalla.

"You know, I don't think Barricade would appreciate you leaning on him." Ella told her.

"Well he's not here is he? So what were you and Optimus doing while you were off alone together this afternoon?" Rachel asked.

"Talking." Ella replied as she tried to walk past her and back to where the others were, but she didn't get far.

Rachel grabbed her arm, "What were you talking about? Anything good? Anything that might indicate he's as interested in you as you are in him?" Rachel asked.

"I'm really beginning to wish I hadn't admitted that I liked him. Can't you just leave me alone about it?" Ella asked. "You haven't stopped bugging me since I told you."

"I'm your best friend it's my job to help you get the guy you like if you won't go after him yourself." Rachel replied.

Ella groaned, "Can't you forget about it just for this weekend? Let me relax and have some time to think, any way's I'm not going to say anything to him unless I really think he might like me too. He's too good of a friend to take the chance of telling him how I feel and then having him be uncomfortable around me or think I'm crazy if he doesn't feel the same way." Ella told her.

"Fine, I'll back off, at least for the weekend." Rachel relented then they headed back to where the others were.

When Ella woke up the next morning everyone else was still asleep laying around the fire pit, the humans close to it and the Autobots laying around them, except for Barricade who had stayed in his car mode for Grannalla to sleep in and was parked a little ways away from the others.

Ella quietly got up and walked around to the front of the house to get some breakfast. When she came back out she noticed someone standing by the barn. She walked over and was relieved when she realized it was Barricade's holoform and not someone sneaking on to her property again.

"What are you doing out here?" she asked as she walked up next to him.

"Just watching the sunrise, it's been so long since I stopped to enjoy the simple beauties of the universe." He replied not taking his eyes off of the orange sky.

They stood there watching the sunrise for a while until Ella asked, "Where is Grannalla?"

"She's still sleeping." He told her.

"Is someone were they'll hear her if she wakes up?" Ella asked.

"Of course, as long as she is in or near my real body I can hear her." Barricade told her.

"You can? Is it just if you want to be able to hear what's going on?" Ella asked a little uncomfortably, remembering what she and Rachel had been talking about the night before, right next to him.

"No, its very difficult to turn off our senses in our normal body the only time we would do that is if we had to use our holoforms for something that we couldn't take the chance of anything distracting us and even then only for short times." Barricade told her then noticing a horrified look cross her face he added, "I'm not going to tell anyone about what you and Rachel were discussing last night."

"Thanks." She said then fearfully asked, "So like when you and Optimus met half way between the vehicles on that first day we met you, neither one of you would have turned off your ability to hear what was going on."

"Exactly, that was hardly something we had to fully concentrate for." Barricade told her.

Ella suddenly wished it really was possible to die from embarrassment. It would have been much easier than wondering how she would be able to face Optimus again knowing that he had heard everything she and Rachel had been discussing; including her admitting that she liked him.

"Are you alright?" Barricade asked.

"I- I'm going for a walk, can you let the others know when they get up and wonder where I am?" Ella asked.

"Of course, but are you alright?" he asked again.

"I just need some time alone to think." Ella replied before heading into the forest.

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Please leave a review. I already have the next chapter written and just have to take the time to proofread it so I've decided I'll proofread it and get it posted right away, even if that means posting two chapters in the same day if I get at least ten reviews on this chapter, I've gotten that many on one chapter before so I don't think it's to much to ask for. If I don't get that many reviews the next chapter will still be up sometime in the next week. 


	10. Chapter 10

Thank you so much for all the reviews, I got nine on the last chapter, that's close enough to the ten I asked for, for me, so here's the next chapter. If any one is interested I have some transformers drawings I'm posting on fanlib sometime today, my user name on there is hekaanna. They're not very good but some of them are alright. fanlib has a giveaway, if you post enough things you can get money for movie tickets and a $200 Amazon gift certificate, anyone who does fan art or fanfiction should check it out. I got an iPod from one of their giveaways last year and it's so nice when people tell you you're wasting your time writing fanfiction to be able to tell them what you've gotten for it.

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"Does anyone know where Ella disappeared to?" Rachel asked when she and the others woke up and she noticed Ella wasn't there. 

"She said she was going for a walk, she seemed upset about something." Barricade told her.

"Do you have any idea what she was upset about?" Optimus asked sounding concerned.

"We had been discussing the holoforms and the fact that we can still hear what's going on in or around our body when we're using them. I'm afraid I over heard some things last night that she wasn't comfortable with me knowing. I assured her I wouldn't tell anyone, but she still seemed upset about something else. She asked if you would have been able to hear what was going on when we used our holoforms to talk, so I assume it has something to do with the reason you seemed so distracted while we were talking." Barricade told him.

"You guys can hear what's going on in your vehicle forms when you're using your holoforms?" Rachel asked horrified as she realized what Ella must have been upset about.

"Yes, and we can feel if people are leaning on us too. If I hadn't been taking care of Grannalla I probably would have turned off my holoform and transformed just to scare you after your comment about me not being around last night." Barricade told her.

"Oh my gosh, this is all my fault, she has to hate me." Rachel said as she started to head towards the woods to look for Ella so she could apologize, she just hoped Ella would forgive her.

"Rachel, stay here." Optimus told her.

"But I have to find her, this is all my fault." Rachel told him.

"It's just as much my fault for not saying anything to her about it. I'm the one who needs to find her and talk to her." Optimus told her.

"What exactly is going on that would have upset her enough to have run off?" Ironhide asked as he walked over to them.

"Depending on how things work out when I talk to her, I'll explain when I get back." Optimus replied then scanned the forest until he found where Ella was; a second later his holoform appeared and then headed into the forest.

"I can't believe this, how could I be so stupid? How could I force her to talk like that? She's going to hate me, she'll never forgive me." Rachel ranted pacing back and forth. "I just-" she balled her hands into fists in frustration, "I just want to-" she stopped as a large human sized blaster was held down in front of her. She looked up at Ironhide and gave him a weak smile, "Exactly." She said as she climbed into his hand.

"I thought you would like the idea, it's always been my favorite way to blow off steam and you certainly look like you could use the distraction." Ironhide told her as he carried her to the other side of the house and barn where the fields were.

------------------------------

Ella had hiked up to an outcropping of rock that over looked the house. This was where she had gone when she was upset for as long as she could remember. She was sitting there with her legs pulled up to her chest and her head laying on her knee's wondering how she would ever face Optimus again, when she heard a branch snap behind her making her jump. She turned to see who was there and almost smiled when she saw May.

The big cat walked over to her and rubbed her head against Ella's. Ella wrapped her arms around her, burying her face in her fur as she started to cry.

"What am I going to do May? How am I ever going to be able to face him again, knowing that he knows how I feel about him? He probably thinks I'm just some pathetic, crazy little human." Ella said as she continued to cry into May's fur.

A few seconds latter May growled at something behind Ella. Ella glanced behind her and jumped to her feet while trying to wipe the tears from her face when she saw Optimus standing there.

"What are you doing up here?" she asked keeping her eyes on the ground at her feet, unable to make herself look at his face.

"Barricade said you were upset and I thought we should talk." Optimus told her.

Ella cringed slightly and waited for him to tell her how crazy he thought she was. She was completely shocked when he stepped forward, lifted her chin and gently kissed her forehead.

"I don't think you are pathetic, I think you are an amazingly strong, brave and compassionate woman and I'm honored that you would care about me. And you're no crazier for loving me than I am for loving you." He told her.

"You love me?" Ella asked in disbelief.

"Yes, I was just unsure of how to tell you. Even after hearing you admit your feelings for me I was unsure of how to tell you that I loved you too. The World Wide Web can be useful, but also confusing when it comes to something as complicated as human courtship. It seems that every site I found said something different or completely contradicted with others." He told her.

Ella smiled, "Well then, from now on stay away from the internet when it comes to our relationship. We'll learn from each other, it really wouldn't be fair that you can try to learn about human courtship so easily and the only way I can learn about your customs is from you." Ella told him.

"Alright." He said bring one hand up to brush through her hair, "First question, would it be rushing things if I were to kiss you now?" he asked.

"Well, we haven't even been on a real date yet and the last guy who tried to kiss me after only one date ended up with a black eye." Ella told him seriously then smiled, "But I think I'll let you get away with it." She said.

She gasped slightly as he suddenly pulled her into his arms and kissed her, one arm wrapped around her back and the other hand gently entwined through her hair against the back of her neck. She wrapped her arms up around his neck as they continued to kiss until an ear piercing scream echoed up from the farm below and they pulled apart.

"What was that?" Optimus asked.

"It sounded like my sister." Ella said as she walked over to the edge of the outcrop and looked down at the farm and groaned when she saw her sister's car in the driveway. "We'd better get down there before she tries to leave and tells someone." Ella said already heading back to the house.

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Please leave a review. I'm not quite happy with the kissing scene, so let me know what you think and if there's anything I should have done to make it better. 


	11. Chapter 11

When Ella and Optimus got back to the house Rachel, Sam and Mikaela were all standing around Ella's sister who was sitting in a chair on the porch and staring fearfully at the Autobots, who were all standing out by the barn trying to keep their distance from her until she calmed down.

"Lilly, what are you doing here? Aren't you supposed to be at collage for a few more weeks?" Ella asked as she stepped onto the porch.

Lilly shot up, running over to Ella and hiding behind her, "Ella there are giant robots all over the place." She said pointing to the Autobots by the barn.

"They are not all over the place; it looks like you scared them all into one spot to me." Ella replied calmly.

"You're not afraid of them?" Lilly asked in disbelief.

"Of course not, they're my friends." Ella told her.

"That's what we tried to tell her, but she didn't believe us." Rachel said.

"Are you sure they won't hurt us or step on us?" Lilly asked.

"One of them has saved my life twice, trust me they aren't going to hurt anyone." Ella reassured her.

Lilly still looked uncomfortable, but started to relax a little bit then noticed Optimus and got a mischievous glint in her eyes that always made Ella nervous. "So who's your boyfriend?" she asked still occasionally glancing nervously over at the Autobots by the barn.

"His name is Optimus Prime." Ella told her.

Rachel raised an eyebrow at Ella when she made no attempt to deny that Optimus was her boyfriend and Ella just grinned at her for a second before looking back at her sister.

"Wait a minute; he really is your boyfriend?" Lilly asked in shocked disbelief.

"Yes, but you can't tell mom or anyone else." Ella told her.

"Yes!" Mikaela suddenly exclaimed then smiled at Sam and said, "I believe you owe me dinner and an apology."

Sam groaned then reluctantly dropped to one knee, "I'm sorry, I'll never question you again." He said.

"Okay, what's going on?" Ella asked watching them.

"Well I had said something about you and Optimus liking each other and Sam thought it was crazy, so we made a little bet. The looser has to take the winner out to eat at the restaurant of their choice and get down on their knees and apologize for doubting the other was right." Mikaela explained smiling.

"So why can't I tell anyone you finally have a boyfriend?" Lilly asked.

Ella hesitated a moment, "Well, he's not exactly human." She replied.

"What do you mean he's not human? He looks human to me." Lilly said.

"He's one of the Autobots." Ella told her.

"What's an Autobot?" Lilly asked.

Sighing Ella said. "I think you should sit down this is going to be a long story."

Once they had finished telling Lilly about the Autobots and everything that had been going on, Lilly asked. "So if they can all turn into vehicles what do they turn into?"

All of the Autobots transformed so she could see what they turned into. When Bumblebee transformed Lilly gasped and ran over to him, "You turn into a Camaro? This is so cool, I love Camaro's, I've always wanted to get one, they're absolutely the coolest car on earth." She said admiring him as she walked around him.

"You want to go for a drive?" Bumblebee asked.

"Seriously? You'll let me?" she asked grinning.

"Of course." Bumblebee replied opening the door for her.

Lilly squealed with excitement as she ran to get in and they took off.

"Well at least she doesn't seem to be afraid any more." Ella said as she watched Bumblebee quickly disappear down the driveway leaving a cloud of dust behind him.

Optimus and Ella were sitting on the porch swing talking, Ella was sitting at an angle with her back against Optimus's chest and he had one arm wrapped around her, holding one of her hands when Sam walked onto the porch almost eight hours later and asked "Do you think they got attacked by Decepticons? I mean it's after five and we haven't heard from them. Bee should know that we need to head home soon."

"They're fine and I've told Bumblebee it's time for them to come back; they should be back in about fifteen minutes." Optimus replied a few seconds later after contacting Bumblebee.

"I suppose we should get stuff ready to leave." Ella said reluctantly.

"I think we can stay here for a little longer." Optimus replied.

When Bumblebee and Lilly finally got back Ella walked over and asked. "Did you two get lost or something?"

"No, I just didn't want to come back. I absolutely love this car." Lilly said.

"Really, you mean I'm not the only one who's fallen in love with one of them?" Ella asked trying to sound serious and not smile.

Lilly's face turned a brilliant shade of red and she quickly said. "No that's not what I meant, I-" she stopped as Ella doubled over laughing and Bumblebee transformed and started laughing too which just made her face turn an even darker shade of red.

"I don't think I've ever seen your face turn that red before." Ella said as she tried to stop laughing.

"That's not funny." Lilly said.

"It's alright; I knew you were just talking about my car form." Bumblebee told her as he rested one huge hand on her shoulders. "Although you really do look funny with your face all red like that."

Lilly shoved his hand away and walked up to the house.

"I think you upset her." Bumblebee told Ella.

"She'll get over it. One of her favorite things to do is see how badly she can make me blush. It was about time I found a way to get her back." Ella replied as the Autobots transformed and she and the others loaded their stuff so they could head home.

Once they had everything loaded Ella walked over to Lilly and asked. "So are you going to say good bye to me or are you still not talking to me?"

"I still can't believe you said that in front of him." Lilly said.

"How many times have you done stuff just to see how badly you could embarrass me?" Ella asked.

"I'm your little sister it's my job to embarrass you." Lilly told her.

"You are such a pain sometimes." Ella told her.

"Yep, that's part of my job too." Lilly said smiling, "I guess I can forgive you for embarrassing me, I would have done the same thing to you." Lilly told her as they hugged then said good bye.


	12. Chapter 12

I'm so sorry for taking so long to get this updated, when I got into Transformers I was attacked by more plot bunnies than I knew what to do with, got new ones for every version of Transformers that I watched and actually didn't know where exactly I was going with this one. After seeing the third movie last weekend I finally got inspired to work on this again and decided to have it end up follow the movies. I do have one problem though, I need ideas to fill in between the movies so if anyone has any suggestions or anything they'd like to see happen let me know. Also does anyone know how much time was supposed to have passed between the second and third movies?

* * *

Almost two weeks later Ella was at the warehouse when Banacheck came and told them that everything had been approved for the building of an underground base for the Autobots on Ella's land.

"These are the plans we've worked out for the base." Banacheck said laying out a large drawing on a table.

The drawing showed one large room with support pillars spaced throughout it that reminded Ella more of a parking garage than somewhere anyone would want to live.

"So this is the main room of the base?" Bumblebee asked.

"No, this is the whole thing, there should be plenty of room for all of you as well as a command center along this wall." he said pointing to one wall.

"What about a medical area and private quarters for them to recharge in?" Ella asked.

"We can put in a few medical tables and equipment in one corner and there's plenty of room for them to park while they recharge." Banacheck replied.

"You know what, you just get the supplies there to build it and let the Autobots, who will have to live there design it." Ella said rolling up the paper and handing it to him.

"We can't do anything too fancy, we have to pay people not only to build the place, but to also keep quite about it, plus the cost of supplies. If the government puts too much money into this someone could notice." Banacheck said.

"Who says you need that many people to help build it?" Ella asked then glanced up at the Autobots and asked, "You guys could help with the construction work couldn't you?"

"Of course, I always assumed we would be doing a large amount of the work to build it anyways." Optimus said.

"Perfect, so you provide the supplies and we'll handle building it, designing it and anything else that might take an ounce of common sense." Ella told him.

"Fine, it's your land, do whatever you want, I'll send you a budget with the amount that can be spent and the cost of the supplies you'll need." Banacheck replied curtly then packed up his stuff and left.

As soon as he was gone Ella started fume, "I don't know how you can stand him or any of the other idiots he works with, they treat you like you're nothing more than machines or vehicles. Why can't they get it through their heads that you're alive and not all that different from them. Well aside from the from the fact that you guys are way more intelligent and have more common sense than probably ninety percent of the human race combined." she said then glanced up and noticed Optimus smiling at her, "What are you smiling about? There's nothing funny about this." she said.

"It's just kind of nice to have someone around who will do my job for me, especially someone who isn't expected to be so diplomatic and can speak their mind without worrying about it having any negative consequences." Optimus said.

"I didn't even think about that, you don't think I could have caused any trouble for you guys, do you?" Ella asked.

"No, you're just a civilian who happens to know about us, you have no real say in what goes on. If you just happen to be here when they are and speak your mind about something they have planned it should have no effect on our relationship with the human government." he told her then smiled, "It just saves me trying to think of a more polite way of saying the same thing. I think we should have you around anytime we're having one of these minor meetings with them."

"So my job would be to keep the idiots in line who don't treat you with enough respect?" Ella asked.

"Exactly." Optimus replied.

"Sounds like a perfect job to me." Ella said, "Now how about we design you guys a proper new home?"

By that evening they had drawn up plans for a large base, it would be a couple of transformer sized stories deep, with enough rooms to hold a couple dozen Autobots incase anymore came to earth. A large medical bay for Ratchet, two weapons rooms, one to store weapons in and the other for making them, Ironhide insisted that his room be right next to the weapons rooms. The command center was on the first floor as well as a section with several human sized rooms and a kitchen and bathroom for any humans that might end up staying there for any amount of time. A few other hidden rooms and escape tunnels would be added when it was being built, but would remain a secret from the government and anyone other than Ella and the Autobots.

On Friday when Ella and Rachel left work Ella noticed that Ironhide was there, "I thought your car was fixed." she said.

"It is, but he offered to keep driving me to work and who wants to drive a wimpy little car when you can have a big, strong, powerful, awesome truck like this?" Rachel asked.

"It's no wonder he's still driving you around if you compliment him like that all the time." Ella said.

"It's not so much a compliment, as just the truth." Ironhide said as the passenger door opened and his holoform appeared in the drivers seat.

"Be careful Rachel, I think you're giving him a bit of an ego." Ella told her.

"Maybe just a little, but if it means I get to hang out with him and his guns and he keeps making me my own guns, who cares?" Rachel said.

"Speaking of guns, do you two have anything planned for this weekend?" Ironhide asked.

"No." they both replied.

"Good, because we've got permission to start building the base, the first batch of supplies will be delivered sometime today which means we need to get digging, or blasting out the area where the base will be." Ironhide told them.

"Oh, and you're going to let me help?" Rachel asked grinning.

"Yep, I just put the finishing touches on a couple of blasters made specially for digging." Ironhide told her.

"Great, lets get going." Rachel said as she climbed in, "We'll see you up there." she told Ella before the door shut and they left.

"They're certainly getting along well." Optimus said as he pulled up next to Ella.

"Yes they are, you don't think there's more going on between them than they're letting on, do you?" Ella asked as she climbed in.

"I don't know, but I haven't seen him warm up to anyone new so quickly in hundreds of years." Optimus told her.

"I guess I'll just have to corner her and ask her if anything is going on between them." she said then added, "I suppose I should be nice and not embarrass her by asking her while she's sitting in him like she did to me."

"It really wasn't so bad was it? I think everything ended up working out nicely." Optimus told her.

"I guess you're right, it did save us a lot of time that we probably would have spent unsure of how the other felt." Ella admitted.

A little over an hour later they arrived at Ella's grandfather's home and could hear almost continues explosions, "I guess Ironhide and Rachel got here first." she said as she got her suitcase out and set it on the porch.

"Yes, Ratchet and Bumblebee should be around here somewhere as well." Optimus told her then transformed and carried her towards where the explosions were coming from.

"It's about time you guys got here, you're going to miss all the fun." Rachel said running over to them and handing Ella a large canon as soon as Optimus set her down.

"Where is Ironhide?" Ella asked when she only saw Ratchet and Bumblebee standing nearby.

"I'm right here." Ironhide said poking his head out of a large hole in the ground that was probably a good sixty feet wide.

"You've already gotten that deep?" Ella asked as they got closer and she saw that he was standing as tall as he could just to see over the edge of the hole.

"Sure, with my canons we'll be done with the digging in a day or two at the most." Ironhide told her before firing his canon again, sending dirt and rock flying away from them and extending the hole by another ten feet or so.

"Good, because I'm sure you're terrorizing May with all this noise." Ella told him, "Now somebody show me how to use this thing." she said holding up the canon Rachel had given her.

"It's so cool, Ironhide really is a genius when it comes to designing weapons, it just plows the dirt and rock right out of the ground and he designed it so it only blows it away from you, so you don't have to worry about getting hit with flying dirt." Rachel said before showing Ella how to use it.

By that evening they had cleared the entire field as well as carved out a large section under part of the forest that surrounded the field. "Well thanks to my spectacular abilities to create canons we'll be able to start pouring the cement tomorrow." Ironhide said as they stepped back to look at what they had accomplished.

"So are you going to turn into a spectacular cement truck to help with that tomorrow?" Ella asked.

"Absolutely not! Do you know what cement could do to my canons?" Ironhide asked.

"Make them not work so spectacularly?" Ella replied, "But then maybe that would help with that overgrown ego you've been getting from spending so much time with Rachel."

"I don't have an overgrown ego, I'm just really that good at what I do, aren't I Rachel?" Ironhide asked turning to look at Rachel.

"Well, you are really good, but you might be getting a little bit of an ego, not that I mind." Rachel replied.

"See, she thinks it's fine." Ironhide said.

"I still think some good old fashioned manual labor without a canon would do you some good." Ella said.

"There will be plenty of that for all of us tomorrow, a cement truck will be here in the morning, but we'll still be doing most of the work." Optimus told them, "Luckily non of us will have to actually turn into a cement truck."

"Oh well, it could have been fun seeing Ironhide covered in cement." Ella said, "So how about some dinner?" she asked Rachel.

"Sounds great, I'm starving." Rachel said then followed Ella into the house.

"So how are you and Ironhide getting along?" Ella asked once they were inside.

"Great, he's even teaching me how to make my own weapons. Why?" Rachel asked.

"You two just seem to be getting awfully close." Ella replied, "So do you like him like that?"

"Well he is really cool, tough and strong, but he's also got this really sweet soft side." Rachel said.

"Ironhide has a soft side?" Ella asked.

"You have to promise not to tell anyone, because he said he'd shoot me if I told anyone." Rachel said.

"Oh yeah, he's real sweet, threatening to shoot you, but alright, I won't tell anyone." Ella replied.

"Well he got left babysitting Grannalla the other day and Barricade insisted that one of us be there and you weren't home so he came and got me then dropped me off at the warehouse. When I got inside Ironhide was using his holoform and down on the floor playing with her then when she started to get tired he was rocking her and singing to her. It was just too cute, then when I remembered I had my camera in my purse and took a picture of him with her he heard the camera and threatened my life if anyone else found out. Of course it didn't sound very threatening since he kept his voice level and calm the whole time to avoid upsetting Grannalla." Rachel told her.

"How cute, in a twisted sort of way since he ended up threatening your life." Ella said.

"Oh it's not like he'd really hurt me." Rachel said.

"I know. Now back on subject, you haven't answered my question and you're not leaving until you do, I can be just as persistent you were with me." Ella said.

"Okay, yes, I like him a lot and I could totally see myself falling in love with him, maybe I'm already starting to fall in love with him. I just don't know how to know if he feels the same way." Rachel admitted.

"Well you could always admit to how you feel while inside his vehicle mode, there might be a little while of embarrassment until you find out how he feels, but it actually worked out pretty well for me." Ella said.

"You're never going to let me forget that, no matter how many times I apologize, are you?"

"You don't have to keep apologizing, things worked out great because of it, but no I'm not going to let you forget about it anytime soon. If you don't want to go with that rout you could always just ask him or ask Ratchet." Ella told her.

"Why would I ask Ratchet?" Rachel asked.

"You haven't heard Sam's horror story about the night he first met them or about Ratchet telling me that he knew how I felt about Optimus before I was even sure myself, have you?" Ella asked.

"No, but you're going to tell me." Rachel replied as they sat down to eat and Ella began to tell her about Ratchet's interesting and sometimes embarrassing abilities.


End file.
